GOTCHA, Published in The Philippine Star, Monday, November 12, 2007
For four years now Fatima Soriano has been inspiring the sick and the troubled. Religious groups seek her out to grace their gatherings. She has spoken in radio and television shows, Holy Masses and prayer rallies, renewing faith in helpless folk — in the Philippines, Indonesia, Korea and Canada. Her constant counsel is to trust in God’s grace. A teleplay has been produced about her. But Fatima is blind; she has been so since birth. She is frail and short for her age of 14, for she has been sick all her life, and once was diagnosed with end-stage kidney failure. It is precisely the sufferings she went through that make adults marvel how Fatima can be so bubbly, always smiling, and talking of God’s care. Even more awesome, she melts away their distresses and ailments — through Mama Mary, she avers.
Charismatic Fr. Jerry Orbos, SVD, had discovered Fatima by happy accident. He was hosting his radio show “Hello Father” on ZNN Radio Veritas one night in July 2003 when a girl with a strained but determined voice phoned in. How come you’re still awake at this time past nine o’clock, the priest had queried? Fatima replied matter of factly that she was waiting for her next dialysis. Docs had ruled then that only peritoneal cleansing every four hours, five times a day, could save her from renal poisoning, and only by a slim chance. But there she was, then only 10, talking like a grizzled veteran. Fr. Jerry and his listeners were stirred. He told her they just had to see each other soon. Fatima chuckled, “How can that be possible when I’m blind?” All the more the priest became determined to meet her. He was sure she’s godsend in his taxing job as Mission Director for the Society of Divine Word-Philippines.
They became instant friends. Fatima loved having someone other than her prayerful Catholic parents, Danny and Fely, to talk to about the Almighty Father and caring Mother Mary. Fr. Jerry was awed to learn in that first meeting that she led her neighborhood’s nightly Rosary prayer. “Even street urchins would join,” he recalled. More personal, he said, the sickly little girl “made Mama Mary so alive” for a Marian devotee like him. “Fatima would converse with the Blessed Mother,” he explained, “and then relay to me what was said, and these would always come true.” He cited as example a speaking tour to Vancouver, when their visas had not arrived by the end of work hours Friday yet their flight was early Sunday. Through Fatima he was assured everything would turn out all right and it did: the courier not only did deliver the travel documents in time for the flight, but their party even got upgraded to better cabin. “Mama Mary is mostly happy, sometimes sad (because of her children’s behavior), but never angry” is how she described her to him.
After Fatima spoke on hope in Fr. Jerry’s televised Sunday Masses, the media took notice. ABS-CBN’s Maalaala Mo Kaya produced a biopic for television, and entertainment and counsel shows couldn’t get enough of her. How could a girl who had gone through painful treatments for ten months, on the brink of death at a tender age, be so full of joy and infectious faith? The answer remained in Fatima’s purity and innocence. For many she personified the Gospel line: “Unless you become like a child, you cannot enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3). A text brigade raised P1.2 million in 2004 to help in kidney transplant. A 23-year-old donor was found with 90 percent compatibility. Still, doctors worried that the donor’s adult arteries and veins would riskily not match Fatima’s smaller blood vessels. But during surgery they turned out to be a perfect fit.
After that experience under the knife, Fatima struggled to be a choir singer. Her fragile lungs and delicate recovery wouldn’t allow it at first. But she prayed for help in her dream. Early this year Fr. Jerry came out with a CD of inspirational songs. Two of the cuts, “Falling Star” and “You’re in My Heart,” were written and sung by her. Two others, written by Fr. Jerry but sung by Fatima too, “Believe Like a Child” and (My Suffering Is) My Offering”, speak about her and others like her with unwavering faith in God and know how to let go for His greater glory. The Catholic Mass Media Awards adjudged their work the Most Inspiring Album of 2007.
Last June during a second trip to Vancouver her parents noticed a heart-shaped red mark appear on Fatima’s lower lip. It seemed like a wound, but Fatima told them not to worry for it was a token given her by the Blessed Mother. Two days later they witnessed something strange during the Mass. People in the church whom Fatima touched would fall on the ground unhurt but “slain in the Spirit.” Fr. Jerry theorized that she had received the gift of healing. The devotees gave testimonies of ailments suddenly vanishing. To verify, Fr. Jerry took Fatima to Naju, Korea, to meet visionary Julia Kim, who proclaimed Fatima is the real thing.
Strange that God would bring into the midst of Filipino devotees and doubters a visionary who is blind at birth. But it is perhaps in the irony that they will sit up and take notice. I couldn’t believe when I met
Fatima that a child barely as high as my chest could “fell” adults. But I saw, I experienced. I queried
Fatima about her “work” Does she not get drained healing? Talking like an adult, she said no and explained that Mama Mary counsels her to pray to avoid negative vibes. Does she know colors? “Only a few,” she said, because of her handicap. “They tell me that red is hot like fire, blue is like water, and isn’t green a male color?” So what is the color of Mama Mary’s hair? “Sorry, sir, I don’t know,” she apologized, then smiled, “But she’s with us now, she’s always with us.” Tilting her head back as if to listen, she adds, “She says hi.”
