An alcoholic and absentee father; a mother who died of renal failure more than 10 years ago. The deep wounds of life and loneliness accepted in the name of Mercy and faith in God. Vernon Noronha, a young singer from Mumbai, speaks to AsiaNews about his faith experience.
Mumbai (AsiaNews) - A young Indian singer, Vernon Noronha, 26, in his first music video, admits that the inspiration of his most popular song, about his father who abandoned the family, comes from Pope Francis and the Jubilee of Mercy. Speaking to AsiaNews he says: "When Pope Francis announced the Great Jubilee of Mercy and opened the Holy Door of Mercy, I felt in my heart that my heart's door was opening and that a painful wound was touched."
"Our Holy Father - he continues - always speaks of love and forgiveness. The only way I know how to express my feelings and emotions is through music. As a songwriter, I poured all my heart into the song. In my video you see my father Jack, an alcoholic, who somehow - between flashbacks of games with his family on the beach and drunken scuffles with police - becomes bankrupt and unable to take care of his wife and his children" .
The music video is entitled "Closer to Home" and the song for his father is titled "Come back Jack” is a song similar to a ballad, sober and soothing and very intimate. "I started writing this song when I realized that my father was lost." Vernon has not seen his father in April 2013.
"In general my father was a very caring and generous person with a very shy personality which is also in some aspect passed on to me. I dedicated this song to my father, because i miss him so much. I remember him every time i sing or hear this song. I hope this song reaches my Dad. "
"His disappearance from my life is a deep wound that takes years to heal It is more painful because it’s left incomplete. This is a deep wound which will take years to heal. The song 'Come back Jack' expresses all this pain into poetry. He says: 'If you want you can come home / You can stay here ...'.
"Pope Francis - continued - has played a vital role in this video .. I started composing poems in this Jubilee and this music is a tribute to the transforming power that this Pope has: he knows the deep emotions that hurt people's hearts . I feel very close to every person living similar situations. My message to them is to trust and have faith in God, because he has a plan for us".
Vernon has another wound: his mother, Violet Noronha died in 2005, of renal failure.
"My mother - he says - was an energetic woman, full of work, wonderful and sweet. Supporting two children with an alcoholic husband was not easy. Yet even in the hardest times, she never left us wanting for anything. Nobody went to bed without having eaten dinner. She was the first to recognize my talent and often told me that she liked the tone of my voice. If I am educated, I owe it to my mother. "
"After both kidneys failed - he recalls – she was on dialysis for four years. But her faith kept her happy and she always encouraged me. Her faith in God was strong as a rock. She always prayed for a miracle and indeed a miracle has happened: for that period of four years my father stopped drinking and took care of my mother. She breathed her last on October 7, 2005 ".