Sister Cecilia Wood, Maryknoll
EARLY on the morning of August 17, 2017, Sister Cecilia Wood passed away in Davao. She was one of the pillars of Davao Medical School and founder of Our Lady of Victory rehabilitation center. Many of her former students in Maryknoll College, like the Alcantaras and the Gonzalezes, gratefully help in supporting Our Lady of Victory. In the late seventies she volunteered to help us in Davao to start a medical school. She was one of the Maryknoll sisters who took up medicine to man what is now Cardinal Santos Hospital. But then they changed their minds in the Archdiocese of Manila This left these sisters high and dry. Some went to hospitals in the US, Sister Wood came to Davao. Although we had good doctor volunteers in Davao, we needed fulltime teachers in Anatomy and Physiology. Sister Cecilia was Godsent. In 1978, she asked me if I could pay for a house for some paraplegics who had no one to care for them. All she needed was rent money. At that time Ateneo de Davao could afford to help. That was the beginning of Our Lady of Victory which has flourished and gone through ups and downs but with Sister Cecilia and her other Maryknoll Sisters, it has survived, helping hundreds of paraplegics and other rehab patients, especially those who could not afford to pay. Of course, besides Sister Cecilia, we had Davao doctors like Dr. Badion Reyes and many others, who volunteered their services and operations pro bono. At one time we had over a hundred patients and all of these had to be fed together with their bantays (caretakers).
All the funding was generated by Cecilia, which went to over millions of pesos. One sunny day when Sister Cecilia had gone to the States on a begging tour, some miscreant convinced the patients with the hokum: Sister Cecilia is able to get money because of us and therefore we should be able to manage that money. That money should go to us. They then proceeded to wheel their wheelchairs from OLV near the airport toward the City Hall. They were going to ask the mayor and other politicians for help. Some of them were able to reach city hall when I got a call and OLV staff picked me up at the Ateneo. As we passed by wheelchairs of OLV patients, they willingly got into the car. By the time we got to the city hall, all of the deluded patients willingly came back with us to OLV.
Sister Cecilia knew she needed money beyond what she could beg so she established projects that could cover some of the expenses. She established a bakery, a grocery store, a wheelchair manufacturing operation, a flower production which she distributed to the banks, a dressmaking operation and many other projects to keep the patients busy and help support themselves. Sister Cele was able to get containers and containers from the Sisters of Providence and their hospitals in Seattle where she came from. There were even computers to manufacture prosthesis. Sister Cecilia was indefatigable in helping OLV to flourish. And also people helped her from architects, to build her houses, and bank personnel who cued her that there was an available piece of land in Samal ideal for the patients of OLV. Another banker sold or almost gave her the property near the airport for her staff to live in and for the laboratories for the flowers.
Sister Wood was a good physician and her students and patients were grateful. Senator Enrile has helped her quite bit since she taught him in Malablon. Many others have done but one who is trying to keep her projects going is Mr.Oscar Hilado who has poured millions into OLV besides the technical and business expertise that he and his former employees supply to Our Lady of Victory. OLV has inspired a huge number of people like Remy Tamayo, Trina Tonogbanua, Lulu Manalo, and many others.
Sister Cecilia Wood will live in the hearts of her former students, patients and former co-workers. May the Lord bless her and all her projects.