From emptiness, to steadiness, in Christ

By Brandon Joseph, San Rafael Parish

I spent the greater part of my life asking two questions: what is my purpose, and where will I spend eternity? I grew up in church. I knew of God. But very early I became disillusioned with what I was seeing, too many inconsistencies, too much contradiction between what was professed and what was lived.

So, I walked with knowledge, but not with understanding. I knew about God, but I did not know Him. It was religion without relationship.

As French mathematician and physicist Blaise Pascal put it, “There is a God-shaped void in the heart of every man that can only be filled by God Himself through His Son Jesus Christ.” I tried to fill that void the usual ways: academic success, recognition, acceptance. From the outside, things looked in order. But inwardly, there was a clear emptiness. Purpose was still missing.

In 2023, I met Sr Sarah Waterman O Carm at Corpus Christi College. That was the beginning. She had a simple habit, ending conversations with “By the grace of God.” It stayed with me. Why invoke grace for things that seemed straightforward? That question lingered.

In 2024, I attended a retreat with the College. That experience introduced me to meditation in a disciplined, intentional way, and it shifted something in me. From there, I began to seriously enquire into the Catholic faith.

When God intends to move in your life, He sends people. In 2025, I met my fiancée, a devout Catholic, and more importantly, a woman of action. While I was still considering the idea of conversion, she was already making calls. The first two parishes we contacted told us plainly: next intake, 2027.

One day we made an impromptu trip to Talparo through San Rafael. She recognised that it was the parish recently assigned to Fr Raymond Francis, a priest influential in her life, and reconnected with him. During a simple introduction, he mentioned that Order of Christian Initiation of Adults (OCIA) classes were beginning the following week. A few calls later, everything aligned. Commitments shifted without resistance. Look at God.

Entering classes with catechists Melanie Smith-Lewis and Priscilla Sinanan brought clarity. I came to understand that we are created to love God and to be in relationship with Him, but sin separates us, and no amount of personal effort bridges that gap. That required a turning. A deliberate one. I turned from sin and, in faith, received Jesus Christ.

Certain lessons stayed with me more than others, particularly those on All Saints’ and All Souls’, and the reality of praying for the dead. Psalm 60:5, “You have inflicted hardships on your people, made us drink a wine that dazed us.”

Those who understand loss will understand this, the pain of losing a parent. My mother passed in January 2026.

Without the reformation I was undergoing, I cannot fathom how I would have come to bear the grief that accompanies a loss so overwhelming. Psalm 61:2, “Listen, O God, to my cry! Attend to my prayer.”

In February, I woke one morning with an unexplainable certainty, my mother was at peace. No reasoning, just conviction. That same evening, after OCIA class had ended and prayers were done, Melanie said, almost in passing, “By the way Brandon, your mother is in heaven. I just know it.” That is not coincidence. That is God placing the right people, at the right time, with the exact words required.

The emptiness is no longer there. In its place, direction, purpose, and certainty. Not that life has become easy but there is now a steadiness. A security in knowing I am loved by the Lord, forgiven, accepted, and made whole in Christ.

Psalm 62:2, “In God alone is my soul at rest; my salvation comes from him.”