My first contact with the home was in the year 2000. I had just come through a very difficult spell a few months prior, a result of which was that I returned to the practice of my faith.

Coming across the Divine Mercy devotion and being drawn to practice it I had a real conversion where I experienced in a very personal way the infinite love which God has for each of us. This set me on a path which was a complete turn around from the one I was living previously. I was suicidally depressed and I didn’t know why, but now looking back, the reason was that I was so false and empty through living the illusion and the lies that the world presented to me as the path to follow. I was lost and without any life in me. Thanks be to God for pulling me out of the black hole I was in.

It was in this context, a few months after my conversion and having discerned that God was calling me to a life completely surrendered to Him, that I met Fr. Rafael, Fr. Felix, and (then) Br. Colum. They had come to England to talk about the Home, and a friend of mine, at whose house they were staying, invited me to meet them.
When I arrived there was a room full of people and Fr. Raphael and Br. Colum were seated. I went over to speak with them. Of the conversation I can remember Fr. Rafael saying to me, “I can offer you a life of poverty with Christ poor, a life of chastity with Christ chaste, a life of obedience with Christ obedient, and the cross.”

I hadn’t heard anyone speak about the religious life so directly and strongly before and I listened with a lot of enthusiasm. I responded that it was exactly what I was looking for. It seemed like an answer to prayer.

In the Easter week of that year I went out to visit the Home in Barcenilla, Spain.There was a group of Irish pilgrims there at the time and I stayed with them, each day going to a different place of pilgrimage: Lourdes, Garabandal, Limpias, amongst others. I had a great time and really loved the family spirit about the place. I can still remember well a homily preached by Fr. Rafael that week with his notable dynamic spirit. He told us the story of Don Bosco and when in his dream Our Lady asked him to go through a field enclosed with thorns. He had to crawl through the thorns which, of course, was very difficult and most of the boys following him stopped and pulled back. It was a homily about perseverance and never giving in, which for me was to be quite prophetic.

I returned home with the intention of returning soon to enter as a servant brother but I fell ill and was unable to do so. I kept in touch with the Home corresponding with Br. Colum, which helped me out a lot, knowing I was in their thoughts as they were in mine.

I was keeping busy back home though and for almost two years working as a volunteer in a hostel for homeless men run by the Legion of Mary. Through this work I got to know the Community Cenacolo, a community founded by an Italian nun named Sr. Elvira Petrozzi, and which was primarily set up to help the lost youth of today, many of whom have addiction problems. It works by using a Catholic spirituality or Christ therapy, as Sr. Elvira calls it.

I entered this community, initially only for a six-month experience, but I ended up staying for three years. Through all of this time I was out of direct contact with the Home of the Mother but our heavenly Mother didn’t want the Home to go out of my mind. Very early on in my days there in Italy I came across a HM magazine in the rack outside of the main office. I was surprised to see it but very happy and for the next three years whenever I was passing through the mother house I would go to look for the HM magazine.

Though the Community Cenacolo left a marked impression on me I still didn’t feel I was in my place and last summer I left. I went on to do the Camino of Santiago and then on to Fatima, all the time asking God to enlighten me concerning my vocation. All along the walk God was giving me signs pointing me to the Home of the Mother. Starting in Lourdes, before the walk, I met a lad named Kevin Jones who had previously spent some time with the servant brothers.

Next, along the walk I met another lad who had just spent some time with the servant brothers as well. Then, only a few days away from Santiago, I got another light. I was breakfasting in a bar with some friends when looking up at the television I saw the news channel switch to show coverage of HM television. It showed Fr. Rafael with Teo and separately two of the sisters speaking in front of the camera. I didn’t understand anything but I was happy to have my thoughts directed towards the Home once again.

Finally I arrived to Fatima. Physically I was tired and my shoes were a bit the worse for wear. Being so far from Santander and living only by Providence I thought my chances of visiting the Home there had passed me by. I was going to go home, but on the last night there in Fatima, during the mass, I saw that Our Lady was asking me again to give all to her and to go up to Garabandal. In response I said that if it was what she wanted then she had to get me there in three days. I wasn’t going to walk. I went back to the residence where I was staying that night and got speaking with a Polish man. I told him I was going up to the North of Spain the next day and he suggested that I jump in the car with him and his friend as they were going to Paris. So I gave them 15 euros of the 30 euros I had been given by a Spanish priest on my first night in Fatima, and I drove up to Garabandal. There I met a friend, Andy Wrenshall, who is building some apartments there and he helped me to get in touch with the Home and drove me to Barcenilla.

I stayed there for a month just before Christmas, working and living with the brothers. I felt really at home and at peace in the environment there and so, upon returning home for Christmas, I already had the intention of returning with the hope of entering as a candidate. I did return and on the 19th of March, St. Joseph's day, I entered as a candidate.

In conclusion I can truly say that I am immensely grateful to God and our Mother for having come to know the Home and for bringing me back here to be a part of this family.

©HM Magazine No. 137 - July/August 2007