By: Jay Sorgi
Sometimes when facing some of the most painful realities of your life, it’s critical to have someone who can “speak your language.”
Those whom Marco Pozo helps in cases within the Diocese of Oakland tribunal can take that literally. From 4,500 miles away in Lima, Peru, his ministry of interviewing those involved in Oakland tribunal cases reveals his capacity to overcome not only a language wall, but the barrier of feeling comfortable in talking about subjects that are uncomfortable.
“He has done almost 2,500 interviews since he started here,” said Mary O’Sullivan with the Diocese of Oakland tribunal.
“When they get the sense that I speak their language, they begin to open up,” Pozo said through an interpreter during a trip to Oakland to visit his granddaughter. “I interview them as if we were friends.”
Pozo’s friendship with the East Bay began in 1991, when his wife and congenitally deaf daughter came to get better educational opportunities.
“When she came here, she realized that she couldn’t take our daughter back to Peru because the services here for the deaf were so much better,” Pozo said.
Pozo stayed back in Lima to help raise their congenitally deaf son, but in time, through the work of a member of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, they arranged for him and his son to come to the East Bay. The move came at a time when the dictatorship of Alberto Fujimori was coming to power.
Bishop John Cummins learned about Pozo and his skills, and tapped him to teach Spanish to the priests of the diocese.
O’Sullivan shared that Pozo also taught her Spanish at a time when the tribunal had lost its only Spanish-speaking person.
“We also needed somebody to translate here and to work with Hispanic, Spanish-speaking witnesses,” O’Sullivan said. “He became our main interviewer for the Spanish speaking people here and beyond.”
Tribunals are canonical, or church, courts for a diocese. Using canon law in adjudicating cases, much of the case load are annulment requests where the tribunal has to discern whether marriages were valid. The role of an interviewer is a critical one in assisting the judges.
An interviewer can provide the judge with more information so as “to decide on whether the marriage is valid or not,” said O’Sullivan. “The witnesses that Marco interviews are essentially the jury, and the judge places a lot of weight.”
“It’s my experience that has given me the sense of when I’m being told the truth or when I’m just being told something that’s not correct or is biased in some way,” said Pozo, who has conducted interviews involving people in eight countries for tribunal cases, speaking in both Portuguese and Spanish..
Yet his ability to help people feel comfortable talking about uncomfortable subjects opens countless doors for him to minister.
“Sometimes people have called back to continue the conversation,” he said. “There’s surprises, always.”
Pozo retired in 2020, and now lives permanently in Peru, but he couldn’t stay away from something that’s much more than a job.
“He continues working for us via email, and that supplements his retirement in Peru,” said O’Sullivan.
But he also continues because he sees the tribunal’s need, not only for qualified and competent interviewers, but people who are able to withstand the challenge of compassionately connecting with petitioners and respondents enduring struggle and trauma in their deepest relationships.
“It’s a hard thing to pick up the phone. The problem is there’s a lot of burnout in this particular kind of ministry. You’re cold-calling people. You pick up the phone. You’ve got a couple of seconds to make that connection,” said O’Sullivan.
“And I can tell you, nobody has done it like Marco. I’ve even had people call me from God knows where, saying, ‘A guy called. He was very nice. Is he there?’ It may have nothing at all to do with the annulment. It may have some other question that they have or something. He has that impact on people.”
Marco sees that impact as his life’s calling, because he sees how God continues to work through a ministry that has lasted more than three decades in a hard-to-find calling.
“I have felt God’s presence, as a servant of God,” he said. “That’s how it feels. Every day.”
Those who are interested in assisting the Diocese of Oakland tribunal as an interviewer are asked to reach out to their pastor.