One of the PBA’s most popular player Ronald Tubid who earned the monicker as “The Saint,” was the man behind the popular image of the soon to be saint Blessed Pedro Calungsod.
The Ginebra Gin Kings player who always took the sign of the cross if he made some shots in the PBA was the model of the Blessed Pedro Calungsod during his college days.
The 17-year-old Blessed Pedro who was murdered in Guam together with Blessed Diego Luis de Santivores during the early days of Christianity in the island way back April 2, 1762.
The saintly image of Ronald Tubid was spotted during his early days in the UAAP. He was then 17 years old when he was spotted by Jesuit priest Fr. Catalino Arevalo in 1998.
The priest was watching the UAAP Games and the TV cameras caught Tubid’s face while he was doing a free throw. Fr. Arevalo have been searching for a long time for a model of Calungsod since there is no available image for the Blessed Calungsod.
According to Tubid, Fr. Arevalo talked to him and stated that the priest was guided by the Holy Spirit to choose the image of Ronald Tubid as the popular image of Blessed Pedro Calungsod.
The Cebuano native will be declared a saint this coming Sunday in a highly-anticipated Sainthood ceremony to be held at the St. Peters Basilica in Rome, Italy.
