He was late and she didn’t even know what he looked like. Prepared for the worst, she brought her friends to be her excuse to leave.
He was coming off a 12-hour shift. He was tired, hungry and nervous — feeling the pressure to be all she prayed he would be.
At least he had seen her photo, provided by a conspiring cupid, also known as his mother.
When Hector walked into the party his mother quickly led him to Jennifer’s table. Finally, they were face to face.
He said hello and introduced himself.
Then … he went back to his parents’ table to eat his dinner?
Looking back he admits that may not have been the wisest move.
“I don’t know. I’m a guy, you know. I don’t know any better. Guys do stupid things.”
Thank goodness Jennifer gave him a second chance.
“I ate really quick and then I came back to her table and that’s when we started talking,” Hector said. “Our conversation just flowed.”
It has been nearly a year since they met at the Arkansas Philippine Association anniversary party. Now they finish each other’s sentences.
Snuggled together on a park bench across the street from the Pulaski County Courthouse, Hector Divino and Jennifer Montesa sat, hand in hand, March 8, playfully recalling their story.

They spoke with Arkansas Catholic just moments after being married civilly by a justice of the peace. It was just another step in the many that will lead them to the sacrament of marriage in a Catholic parish in their native Philippines on May 6.
Desiring to honor the customs of their homeland, Divino and Montesa wanted to marry in the birthplace of the bride, but since he is a U.S. citizen and she only a legal permanent resident, going to the Philippines to marry suddenly got very complicated.
“Our Catholic church back in the Philippines needs some papers, some proof for his citizenship and also proof that he is still single because there is no divorce in the Philippines,” Montesa said.
So proof of marriage is easy — a marriage license, but how do you prove you’re single?
“That’s what I wondered,” Divino said.
“They have a paper called capacity to marry, something like that, I don’t know. They need to get that from the U.S. Embassy,” Montesa said. “They really advised us that it would be better, a lot easier, if we got married here first, in that case, they don’t have to ask for other papers.”
Divino’s aunt is planning the wedding in the Philippines and she is working with local officials to help the couple provide the documents they need to marry there.
The Catholic Church in the Philippines will require them to show their marriage license and baptismal and confirmation records.
Since both Divino and Montesa were born in the Philippines, their baptismal records are already there, but he was confirmed in Little Rock. And even though she was confirmed in Manila, the record is lost, so she will have to be confirmed again before they can marry in the Church.
“That’s why we have to go to the Philippines two weeks early because I have to be confirmed first,” she said.
In the meantime, the couple have been doing their marriage preparation with Father Richard Zawadzki, SVD, pastor of Our Lady of Good Counsel in Little Rock. He is also preparing Montesa for confirmation.
Even though it is really complicated, both feel it is worth it.
“I’m glad that I finally found the woman of dreams,” Divino said. “It took me a while. I’m 35. I believe in that thing, that good things come to those who wait.”
Both consider the union an answer to prayer.
“My mom told me if you want to find the right woman go the adoration chapel,” Divino said.
He spends an hour on Wednesdays at the perpetual adoration chapel at Our Lady of Good Counsel.
“There’s a statue of the Virgin Mary on the far right corner (of the chapel) and before I met Jennifer I was praying through her to help me find my future wife … and here’s Jennifer,” he said.
“I had also been praying for him all this time,” Montesa said. “I really prayed to God that he’ll give me a man who’s also Catholic … because my heart really belongs to Catholic Church.”
Have you noticed a mother’s fingerprints all over this story? In fact, Dafrosa Divino is the reason her family came to the United States. Recruited for a job in nursing, she applied for immigration through Baptist Rehabilitation Institute and the family moved to Little Rock in 1973.
The family built a new life surrounded by a small, but close-knit Filipino community living in central Arkansas. So it is not surprising that shortly after Montesa moved to Little Rock from Manila in 2004 that she met her future mother-in-law at a Filipino prayer group.
Like Divino, Montesa, 32, was recruited to work as a registered nurse, but in this case, with St. Vincent Health System. It just so happened that Dafrosa Divino was good friends with one of Montesa’s co-workers, and she made sure Montesa didn’t miss the anniversary party in April 2005.
With such a great distance between the couple and the bride’s family in the Philippines, permission to marry was achieved through modern technology.
“I asked her father through the Web cam if I may have permission to marry his daughter,” Divino said.
Though custom calls for the wedding to be in Manila, it will be held at Santa Monica Catholic Church in Zambales. In addition to being the home of Divino’s family, it is also the location of St. Vincent’s medical mission for 2006. The couple set their date to coincide with the mission so many of their friends from Little Rock could attend the wedding.
The wedding will be May 6 and the mission begins May 8. In lieu of a honeymoon, the couple will work at the mission, which will provide free medical check-ups and medicine.
The couple will return to Arkansas May 15 where they will live in their new home in Alexander. She will continue with St. Vincent Doctors’ Hospital as a registered nurse, and he works in guest services at the Peabody Hotel. He plans to go to nursing school in July.

Catholic wedding traditions in the Philippines
The groom’s family typically pays for all the wedding expenses.
In addition to bridesmaids and groomsmen, the couple have one primary and three pairs of secondary sponsors. Similar to godparents, the primary sponsors are an older married couple close to the family. Secondary sponsors are normally unmarried friends of the couple. During the ceremony one pair lights the wedding candles to symbolize God’s presence in the marriage; another pins a long white veil on the groom’s shoulder and over the bride’s head to symbolize unity; and the last pair ties a white cord around the couple to symbolize the marital bond.
Though Jennifer Montesa will wear a traditional wedding dress, Hector Divino will wear a Barong Tagalog, the formal attire of a Filipino male. Barong means “dress of” and Tagalog is the term applied to native Filipinos who live in Manila and adjacent provinces. It includes a formal embroidered, often translucent, shirt worn over another white shirt with dark pants. The formal shirt is worn untucked similar to a coat.
At the reception, the couple release two white doves held in a white paper bell to symbolize a peaceful marriage.

Subscribers to the print edition of Arkansas Catholic saw this story in our annual wedding section, along with other stories on diocesan requirements for marriage in the Church, answers to engaged couples’ questions, planning wedding photography and more. Click here to subscribe today, so you’ll get all the news every week.