Thinking about my personal testimony, I see that I can address it from several viewpoints. My early days, my youth in Spain, my integration into Africa and my return to Spain… in all of these I could recount experiences of my Hospitaller life, all in terms of the joy of a vocation to which you know the Lord has called you.

I do not know when my vocation began, and I always say that it was “at my mother’s breast”, and I might add that even though I have sometimes been through bad patches, if I were to be re-born, I would once again become a Hospitaller Brother.

After 42 years I could explain many of my experiences by the side of the sick, of my Brothers, of the Brothers undergoing formation, and now with our elderly and sick Brothers, and those who have gone before us in the vocation and in the charism… But there is one very intimate experience which has strengthened my union with God and my Hospitaller vocation.

Just over two years ago, when I was able to say that I was very happy and fulfilled in my vocation, the Lord saw fit to visit me with sickness, viewed now from the other side. Not others being diagnosed, but me, and the diagnosis was not particularly encouraging and the first test results left me with little hope: a malignant inoperable tumour.

I have never felt more at peace with myself than I was when they broke the news to me; I was astonished at my joy and my acceptance of God’s will. I felt a sense of peace which did not have a human source; I felt that God was with me and was saying, move onwards, trustingly.

I feel that the Lord gives us the strength we need to accompany others and to accept our own difficulties.

I have no idea what the Lord has prepared for me. I do know that I wish to pursue the path to He is pointing out to me. I want to follow in His hands, to allow Him to fashion me as a potter fashions his clay. I want to continue being His witness to my Brothers and to our patients. I want to care for my Brothers who have worn themselves out in hospitality, who have brought us to where we are now, for whom we have received the legacy of St John of God.