WEST PALM BEACH | Growing up in communist Cuba, isolated from different cultures and discouraged from religious practice, learning and living the Catholic faith wasn’t easy, said Armando Garcia, coordinator of Hispanic ministry for the Diocese of Palm Beach. He shared the lessons he has learned while speaking at a Theology on Tap gathering July 24 in West Palm Beach.
Theology on Tap invites young adults 18-39 to learn more about their faith and to share in the Catholic community. Since its creation in the Archdiocese of Chicago in 1981, the program has proven to be a successful vehicle for young adults interested in learning and coming together to feel welcomed and valued in the Catholic Church.
With “Allowing God to Write Your Story: Stepping through the open doors in faith” as his topic, Garcia talked about his upbringing in the Archdiocese of Camagüey in Cuba and his involvement with the Pontifical Society of the Holy Childhood, an organization formed in the 19th century with the motto of “children praying for children, children evangelizing children, children helping children worldwide.”
At age 13-15, Garcia said he regularly traveled with Salesian nuns to evangelize in rural areas of Cuba. In 2008, when he was 15, he traveled to Ecuador for the third American Missionary Congress, meeting people from North, Central and South American countries. “I grew up not in a Catholic family but in a parish community, where I met Jesus through the (Holy Childhood) society I spoke about. And so, I got to Ecuador and I found out that the church was bigger than what I had in Camagüey, Cuba,” he said.
“I realized that being close to Jesus all of my childhood was worth it,” Garcia added.
His worldview and hopes for the future immeasurably expanded when, as an 18-year-old in 2011, he was able to move to the United States. Through connections he made at the Southeast Pastoral Institute in Miami and his parish, St. Juliana in West Palm Beach, Garcia was able to attend World Youth Day in Brazil in 2013 and Krakow, Poland, in 2016. Both were life-changing events, he said.
“Being open to God’s will, sometimes you don’t even know that you are open to God’s will, but God is working through your life, and through people in your life,” Garcia said. The welcome he received at St. Juliana from Father Alfredo Hernández and Claretian Sister Vivian Gonzales, then-pastor and faith formation director, respectively, meant the world to him, he said.
As an active Christian in Cuba, he was barred from being involved in media there. But through SEPI, Garcia was offered a part-time job doing a radio show on Radio Paz, operated by the Archdiocese of Miami. And after WYD in Brazil, he helped start Radio Católica Online, an internet radio station operated out of St. Juliana, which is now Radio Católica Online TV.
“That’s one of the fruits throughout the years, if I look back. I say, OK, maybe with my poor English but good intentions, maybe putting a good heart to it, God has spoken and God has done wonderful things with me and with the friends that I have met,” Garcia said.
The goal of Theology on Tap of Palm Beach County is to unite, strengthen and grow the Catholic young adult community in the Diocese of Palm Beach by exploring the faith and fellowship. The next Theology on Tap meeting is set for 7 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 28, at Mathews Brewing, Co., 130 S. H St., Lake Worth Beach, with Sister Jadwiga Drapala of the Sisters of the Most Holy Soul of Christ the Lord as the scheduled speaker. For more information or to contact Theology on Tap PBC, visit www.TheologyOnTapPBC.com or email TheologyOnTapPBC@gmail.com.
