COTABATO CITY -- Another priest of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate (OMI) succumbed to cardiac arrest Wednesday night.
“At the time of his death, he was assigned at NDU residence. He expired at the Notre Dame Hospital at about 9:05 p.m. after receiving the last rite and in the presence and company of his fellow Oblates, Order of Preachers sisters and some relatives,” Fr. Eliseo Mercado, OMI said of Fr. Manuel “Manny” Mina.
He was 71 years old.
Fr. Mina was the second Oblate priest to have died this month. Last August 7, Fr. Elino “Eling” Isip, OMI, also died in Quezon City.
Interment for Fr. Mina is yet to be announced.
The OMI is a congregation of missionaries that included His eminence Orlando Cardinal Quevedo, OMI, DD, archbishop of Cotabato and Jolo Bishop Angelito Lampon, OMI, DD.
The congregation has been in difficult missions around the world, including Sulu and Tawi-Tawi. They are into various ministries, including education, parishes, inter-religious dialogues, media, livelihood assistance and services to poor communities.
Many of its missionaries experience violence while performing missionary works in Sulu and Tawi-Tawi missions. An Oblate Bishop was brutally killed in Sulu along with several other OMI priests. Some were kidnapped by extremist groups.
But that did not stop the Oblates from “daring the undared” and continue missionary works among the less fortunate brethren belonging to other faith.
Fr. Mina was born in Alcala, Cagayan Valley. Before joining the Oblates, he aspired to become a veterinarian taking Veterinary Medicine at the University of the Philippines. Then he moved to Mindanao where he took accountancy course at Oblate-run Notre Dame University in Cotabato City.
Fr. Mercado said Fr. Mina’s parents influenced him to join the priesthood. “His desire to become a priest was nurtured by his parents during his childhood, in their example of a life giving and self-sacrificing love for each other and for their children,” Mercado said.
“The first Oblate priests, whom he met, were foreigners and he was impressed by their presence in our islands who were so far from their homes and yet so dedicated to their missionary work,” he added.
His desire to become an Oblate was further boosted by the good examples shown by the young Oblate seminarians. “(That) fostered his vocation to become an Oblate,” Fr. Mercado said.
Then Oblate provincial superior, Fr. Joseph Milford, OMI, the native of Cagayan Valley went straight to the OMI Novitiate seminary in 1967 without passing through the Juniorate formation stage.
He was ordained priest on March 27, 1976 and his first assignment was as assistant parish priest of Midsayap, Cotabato from May 1976 to August 1977 (and again in May 1978) and of Banisilan, Cotabato (then an isolated and almost inaccessible parish) from August of 1977 to March 1978.
Mercado said when the Oblates opened a parish in Caloocan City, Fr. Mina became its first parish priest. As parish priest of Birhen ng Lourdes, Bagong Baryo in Caloocan, Fr. Mina worked mostly with the urban poor “whose conditions cry out for justice.”
“They helped me become more aware what it means to be a real Oblate. They accept you not because you are a priest but because they see that you are willing to throw in their lot with them," Mercado then quoted Fr. Mina in an article posted on the OMI newsletter.
After his parish assignment in Caloocan, Fr. Mina became NDU chaplain. He also supervised the NDU campus ministry programs.
His expertise in formation of young Oblates brought him to the OMI Juniorate seminary inside the NDU campus in 1985. At the same time, Fr. Mina taught Philosophy among Oblate seminarians.
From NDU, Fr. Manny became the Novice Master of the OMI Novitiate in Tamontaka, Datu Odin Sinsuat, Maguindanao. “He accompanied seminarians, young people and professionals who seek to give their life to God as one with us," Fr. Mercado said.
He then went for a renewal program at St. Louis University in the US where he deepened his formation ministry.
Upon his return, Fr. Mina, according to Fr. Mercado, became director of the postulants, a stage in OMI formation where Fr. Mina accompanied young professionals in search of their vocation as Oblates of Mary Immaculate.
From formation duties, he was assigned to the Oblate Missionary center in Fairview, Quezon City where he engaged in retreat work.
Fr. Mercado said Fr. Mina was a good cook and he loved to cook, especially Ilocano dishes.
Fr. Mina became Superior of the OMI Scholasticate from May 1998 to 2000 and elected to the OMI Provincial Council in charge of the Formation.
“Manny go to God and pray for us,” Fr. Mercado said of his confrere.(PNA)
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