2025: The Year Mercy Carried Us
How can I describe 2025? So much happened, but if I need to describe it in a single phrase, it would be this: 2025 is a year spent learning how to walk stronger.
Much of what we did was new, untested, and at times uncertain. Yet through every trial, one realization emerged: Adonai's Mercy House is not just moving; it marches with a purpose.
What the Adonai's Mercy House is certain about is this: God will guide AMH in its journey of mercy. Helping children suffering from cancer is a mission that is worthy of His attention and care.
I have been involved with organizations that went trough reinventing themselves. I know that such a process rarely follows a straight line. This year, we had to walk through challenges that tested our resolve as a young organization.
Although Adonai's Mercy House has spent more than a decade helping children with cancer, the truth is that we formally organized as a nonprofit less than two years ago. In many ways, we are still learning to walk—rationalizing our internal systems, strengthening our processes, and slowly shaping the programs that will define AMH for the next decade.
Some days felt like laying tracks while the train was already moving. There were times when the needs of families far outpaced our organizational capacity, and moments when the urgency of a child's condition forced us to rethink our priorities.
We learned that building a sustainable nonprofit is not only about compassion; it is also about structure, clarity, and discipline. The work behind the scenes—policy writing, coordination, budgeting, partnerships—is not visible to most, yet it forms the backbone that allows mercy to do its healing work.
At the same time, 2025 opened doors to new possibilities that none of us could have imagined when we began. One of our most significant steps forward was partnering with Mary Johnston Hospital in Tondo, Manila to open up a pediatric oncology ward.
This initiative is still young, and like all new programs, it continues to evolve. But every time I visit the ward, I see something unmistakable: a place that radiates comfort in the midst of suffering.
Families have told us that the ward has become a refuge where their children can rest, receive treatment, and feel cared for—not just medically, but emotionally. They speak of the warmth of the space, the kindness of the staff, and the sense that they are not alone in their struggle.
We also began conceptualizing additional programs around the heart of our mission: to care not only for children, but also for the carers who hold their hands through every painful step of the journey.
This year, we explored ways to support caregivers, mostly mothers, whose own emotional and mental health is often overshadowed by their children's illness.
We are only at the beginning, but our direction is clear. Cancer affects an entire family, and our help must embrace the whole circle of love that surrounds each child.
Our community-based cancer awareness and early detection activities are still in the pipeline, but the need for them is clear. Families often come to us late in the disease, carrying diagnoses that might have been gentler had they been discovered earlier. As we prepare the groundwork for these initiatives, we move with the conviction that prevention and education are vital extensions of our mission of mercy.
Yet despite the challenges, my heart warms every time I witness the small but powerful ways AMH has touched lives. Families tell us that the support we provide—whether through financial assistance, hospital care, or simply a listening ear—lightens burdens they had been carrying alone.
One of the most joyful parts of our year were the small gatherings we organized for our young cancer warriors. During these events, children play and eat together, receive gifts, and laugh with abandon. These scenes remind us of what this mission is truly about. For a couple of hours or so, illness vanish. They get to be children again and not patients. Their smiling faces prove that mercy works.
The work of AMH demands that we keep breaking barriers, shaping new paths, and taking leaps of faith. 2025 has taught me that we are in the right track and that we will eventually discover the right formula for helping young cancer warriors and their families.
We are confident that we can, as long as mercy and love continue to lead us. As Philippians 1:6 says: "Being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."
