Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 10 June 2025
Homily on the advanced birthday celebration and book launching last June 4 of Dr. Vic Santos Jr., President of Fatima University Medical Center in Valenzuela and Antipolo  

We heard today in the first reading St. Luke’s account of St. Paul’s departure from Miletus to Rome for his trial and eventual martyrdom. We are told how the priests and leaders of the Ephesus community cried as St. Paul bid goodbye. It was a major turning point in the Apostle’s life.

We too are gathered tonight at a major turning point in the life of Dr. Vic as he officially becomes an elder among us, a senior sixty cent. There are no crying as we so filled with joy celebrating his gift of life. Like the Ephesians who were so glad in being a part of the life and mission of St. Paul, we praise and thank God for Dr. Vic’s gift of self especially to us, his family and friends and colleagues. 

I’d like to focus your attention to St. Paul’s speech where he discussed how he had used his hands in his ministry, “You know very well that these very hands have served my needs and my companions. In every way I have shown you that by hard work of that sort we must help the weak, and keep in mind the words of the Lord Jesus who himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive'” (Acts 20:34-35).

What a beautiful imagery of the hardworking hands of St. Paul who was a tent maker by profession who earned money for his own needs so as not to be a burden to the community.

With his caring and loving hands, people accepted Jesus Christ and Christianity.

With his gentle and kind hands the people saw and experienced the love of God, felt more convinced than ever of God’s presence among them.

With his strong hands as an Apostle of Jesus, the people felt the discipline of God.

It is the same thing why we are here tonight. So many sights were restored by the gentle hands of Dr. Vic that helped us to better or even see again.

Dr. Vic’s hands toiled not only in the clinic and OR but also in the tennis court and golf course as well as the kitchen that reminded us of God’s loving presence among us, of the Divine grip that everything will be fine so we can enjoy life. The hands of Dr. Vic as an ophthalmologist, as a husband and a dad, a brother and a friend and a colleague tell us we are in good hands. Like the hands of St. Paul, his hands allowed us to be touched by God’s love and mercy, kindness and forgiveness.

But there is something else about the hands of Dr. Vic I would like you to reflect upon. Like St. Paul, Dr. Vic’s hands not only restored sight but most of all allowed us to have vision, of seeing beyond physical or material things.

St. Paul’s hands were so gifted that more than half of the New Testament writings were from him; in fact, he was the first to write about Jesus Christ, way ahead of the gospel writers. By his writings, we are able to have a glimpse about God in Jesus Christ and eternal life.

With his gifted hands in writing not just prescriptions but also elegant prose and essays, Dr. Vic opened our eyes to see the deeper realities and truth behind our many common experiences in life. His hands seem to have eyes too that he can weave a beautiful tapestry of the joy of living side by side with its many pains and hurts, even losses and griefs, failures and disappointments. Dr. Vic’s hands are so precise not only in surgery but especially in writing, giving us hope to never give up, to always forge on, and be open to many possibilities in life.

Like St. Paul, Dr. Vic can boldly proclaim of the timeless truth of Christ’s teaching that “it is better to give than receive” because he had experienced God’s abundant blessings through his very hands that were always opened, ready to work and take on new tasks, willing to hold others hands to lead and guide them to healing and new life.

Salamuch po, Dr Vic in sharing with us your blessed hands that taught us to find God we rarely see due to our many blindness in life.

Your hands did not only heal our sight but gave us a vision of God present in us and among us always. We pray like Jesus in the gospel tonight that the Father may consecrate you with his sacred hands in order to bless you with more fulfillment and fruitfulness on your 60th birthday. With Dra. Mary Anne and your sons – Angelo, Francis, and Vince – may God fill your hands with his blessings, holiness and healing. Amen.