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The 'megamoms', in the Philippines
A “megamom” at work
Elizabeth Lopez, an accounting graduate who used to work with the government central bank, volunteered to do a feasibility study for a social project in this area. Lopez, who also teaches math, accounting, and entrepreneurship at the Banilad Center for Professional Development, was also asked to head a training project for 60 economically disadvantaged moms from Barrio Luz.
Lopez said: "I said yes, but inside me I was afraid. Can I do this? Am I capable? Then I thought about St. Josemaria Escriva's life, how he always mentioned service to the poor: ‘A son of God cannot entertain class prejudice, for he is interested in the problems of all men. And he tries to help solve them with the justice and charity of Our Redeemer’ (Furrow, 303).
The group secured a grant from the United Parcel Service (UPS), which provided the materials for the cooking and crafts classes and salaries for the professional team who would manage the cooperative. This was exactly what we needed for the project to take off."
After a year of providing skills training, the cooperative was organized and formally launched on July 12, 2006 as Cebu Megamoms Multipurpose Coperative, with the aim of alleviating poverty and instilling values among the poor.
Megamoms sponsoring a service project in another Cebu district
Plans are to train another batch of mothers. Lopez says they hope to obtain a bigger grant from UPS early this year. The grant will finance the setting up of a day care center to enable moms to attend classes. The second batch of training will not only benefit more poor families from Barrio Luz but also poor families from Carbon and the mountain Barangay of Balamban. The Barrio Luz moms who were in the first batch will train the second batch of mothers. They will also earn salaries as trainers, says Lopez. Fifteen mothers will train while 30 will be substitute teachers.
Back in the beginning, López found plenty of difficulties. Once, while praying in the chapel, she saw a book of St. John of Avila left by someone. She flipped open the pages and read this passage on "unlimited forgiveness" which, she said, has helped her cope with the difficulties in friendship and apostolate: "Forgive always, promptly and wholeheartedly. Your patience has to get ahead of your bad feelings, wearing them out before they provoke harm. Give them an opportunity, at least by your conduct. Meet their angry outbursts with gentleness, their boastfulness with humility, their reviling with prayer, their harshness with meekness. The little frictions of each day should not lead us to lose our peace and joy. We cannot allow our pride to get the better of us in this regard"(St. John of Avila).
Lopez says she always asks St Josemaria in her prayer: "Teach me how to treat them, that I should not be too tough nor too soft. The cooperative is successful, but my goal is to guide them to bring them back to God."
But there have been significant changes in spite of the difficulties. Lopez says children stopped saying bad words because the moms stopped saying them. Children remembered to pray because their moms were praying. Children study more and help in household chores. "They pray the rosary now. Moms pray with the children. Families now go to Sunday mass together. There is better food on the table because the moms now know how to cook," says Lopez.
Some of the moms also work at the cooperative's canteen and make fashion accessories for sale. Also, some couples who had been living together for years and already have children were married in group weddings held last year and this year. Children were baptized after their parents attended classes on the sacraments.
On a personal level, Lopez says: "I've also realized that sanctity is possible in ordinary life through my dealings with people. When I am with them, I can feel that the Founder of Opus Dei is with me. I am doing this with him. He's whispering to me, ‘Just do it. Just go on’."
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