Father JOSE CREMADES (17 March 1931 to 7 May 2017)

Father Joe Cremades, former Regional Vicar of the Philippines, left us at 4:53 p.m. on 7 May 2017.

Jose Monerris Cremades was born in Jijona, Alicante (Spain) on 17 March 1931. He joined Opus Dei on 1 May 1950. In 1953 he moved to Rome, and obtained a doctoral degree in Canon Law from the Pontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas (Angelicum) in 1957. During his stay in Rome, he lived with the founder, St. Josemaria Escriva. He went back to Spain in 1957 and obtained a licentiate in Civil Law from the Central University of Madrid in 1959.

He was ordained to the priesthood on 9 August 1959 in Madrid. That same year, he moved to the United States where he carried out his pastoral ministry in Chicago, St. Louis and Madison. He worked in the regional government of Opus Dei in the United States.

He arrived in the Philippines in 1965, when the apostolic work in the region was just beginning. He was the Regional Vicar of the Philippines from 1966-1992 and Regional Delegate from 1992-2003. He carried out an active pastoral work for men and women in the Metro Manila area. He worked tirelessly to lay the foundations and develop the apostolic work of Opus Dei in the Philippines, as well as in Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan and Macao.

Fr. Joe (as many would call him) was exemplary in living his dedication to God in Opus Dei, striving to transmit to all the spirit of holiness in ordinary life that he received directly from St. Josemaria. Since 2003, when he finished his work in the regional government of Opus Dei, until a few days before his hospital confinement, and despite failing health, he regularly travelled on different days of the week to give spiritual guidance to professional men at the Sangandaan Cultural Center (Makati), University of Asia and the Pacific (Pasig) and PAREF Southridge School (Muntinlupa).

He succumbed to a stroke on 7 May 2017.