About 2 weeks ago,the Mercedarians welcomed 3 new postulants to the formation progarm. The following is the vocation story of one of the postulants, Tu Pham:
I was born in a small town South Vietnam. My family was devoutly Catholic during my childhood, and my grandfather made a point of developing good habits of Mass attendance at a young age. I moved to the United States when I was 21 years old.
At the time that I moved to the United States, there was new legislation regarding immigration for person over the age of 21. This meant that I had to go through an immigration interview—an idea that filled me with great fear. Thankfully, my grandfather sent me a letter of encouragement that instructed me to pray to Mary for her assistance. I took his advice and prayed slowly with my heart. After doing this for two months, my interview came. By this time, I was able to face the interview without fear or worry, confident in my hope. I was allowed to stay in the country.
After this, I began my real journey to God through Mary. We all have different paths, but a similar way to God through doing ordinary things with a great depth of love. I began to attend Mass regularly. Soon, I also felt the beginnings of a deep desire to become a religious brother. I talked to my parish priest and was given a few different opinions and ideas about communities to visit. One priest, knowing my great devotion to the Blessed Virgin, told me that I should visit the Mercedarians in Philadelphia because of their similar devotion.
In the end, I chose to become a Mercedarian because I saw in the Order a place for my great Marian devotion. In addition to this, the common respect and love amongst the brothers is a wonderful and attractive aspect of the Mercedarian life.