How I Met the Home
Sr.Leticia Enriquez
Hello, I am Sr. Leticia Enriquez. The question is how I met the Home of the Mother? Well, I was born in the city of Toluca, Mexico. Everything began in ’98 when some friends of my family gave us a phone call, inviting us to go to a talk followed by a Mass in a Church in Mexico City (an hour and a half from where I lived). The talk would be given by a priest who was the founder of a religious order. He came from Spain together with Mother Ana and another sister. They would explain to us how the Home of the Mother began and what its missions were.
Some friends who belonged to the same groups as I (the Garden of Mary), together with my sisters and I, decided to go to meet them. We reached the church and after the talk and the Mass, we had the opportunity to greet them. We knew that they would be in Mexico for a few more days and we invited them to visit us in Toluca and speak about the Home of the Mother there as well. They accepted the invitation and my friends and I organized the meeting, we rented a hall, and we began to invite friends, relatives and other people so that they could also meet them.
We had the talk and then the Holy Mass, in which two other priests concelebrated with Father Rafael: Fr. Anselm from the city of Cuernavaca and Fr. Vicente from the city of Monterrey. They as well had wanted to meet Fr. Rafael and the sisters. Afterwards, we invited them to dinner and we went to the house of Alejandro Flores, one of the friends in our group. We ate dinner and talked. The sisters told us that they had taped a few cassettes and we made them sing some of the songs that they composed. They, a bit shyly, had no other choice but to sing. We also sang a song to Our Lady and we told them a few experiences. The time came for them to go, we said good-bye and we asked Father Rafael to give us his blessing.
After their trip, they began to send us the magazine. Two years later, we heard once again that Fr. Rafael and a few sisters were going to come to Mexico City and to Toluca to see “Clara-Vision,” a Catholic television channel in Toluca, since they as well were going to start a television channel to give good criteria and in this way reach more people. They wanted to learn how to use the cameras and other machines.
My sisters and I called all our friends to tell them the good news that Fr. Rafael and the sisters were coming once again. We began to organize things to be able to invite them to come and visit and once more have a meeting with them. They accepted. At the end of the meeting, Father Rafael celebrated Mass and we headed towards the house of a friend and talked with them for a while there. My friends and especially I told them how we would like to meet the community in Spain, but that it was a little difficult because of our economic situation. (I had been feeling the call to the religious life for a while and was looking for an order). I had already decided to enter a religious order and had therefore quit my job, but I was looking for a job where they would pay me more and thus be able to save the necessary money to travel to Spain and meet the community. I commented all this to Fr. Rafael and the sisters. Afterwards, he asked me why I didn’t return with the sisters that Tuesday to Spain. This was Thursday. I quickly thought, “I have no obligations.” I had already quit my previous job and they still hadn’t given me any response about the new job for which I had applied. Therefore, I said yes and, well, here I am still. And this is how I met the Home of the Mother.
©HM Magazine No.128 - January/February 2006
