To Give Light
Scholarships, school supplies, and tuition assistance for students whose only obstacle is money — the cause Reynaldo gave the most of his own to.
A barangay captain who believed in people before they believed in themselves. A mother whose compassion reached far past her own doorstep. This is where their good works are gathered, remembered, and carried forward.
Reynaldo and Sylvia Gealon never kept a ledger of the people they helped. There was no foundation, no press release, no plaque — only decades of showing up: for neighbours, for students who needed tuition, for families in the middle of the worst week of their lives.
Their children are gathering that record now, while it can still be told properly. Not as a memorial, but as a thank-you — and as the foundation of the KASIKAS Humanitarian Corps, which continues the work in their name.
Barangay captain and, for a great many people in his community, the first person to say yes. He served in local government not as a career but as an extension of what he was already doing: settling disputes before they hardened, finding a way when families said there was none, and treating public office as a debt owed rather than a prize won.
He raised his children on a simple, demanding principle — that education is the one inheritance nobody can take from you, and that having a little more than your neighbour obliges you to notice your neighbour.
Papa gave me the greatest gift when I was a child — he believed in me. So I carried on, hoping to be just half the man that he is.
— His son, Atty. Rey M. Gealon
Sylvia was the household's steady hand and its softest one. Where her husband opened doors, she made sure nobody walked through them alone — remembered for her presence at bedsides that were not her family's, and for applauding hardest at the back of the hall for the child who had done worst.
She had a particular gift for the moment after failure — the moment most people are left alone in. Her son still credits a single evening in 1989, after a speaking contest he badly lost, as the reason he became a lawyer and an orator at all.
You nurtured me to become who I am today — so full of love & mercy, grace & compassion.
— Her son, on her third anniversary
The KASIKAS Humanitarian Corps did not invent its programmes. It simply named what Reynaldo and Sylvia had already been doing for forty years, and built a way for other people to join in.
Scholarships, school supplies, and tuition assistance for students whose only obstacle is money — the cause Reynaldo gave the most of his own to.
Medical accompaniment, hospital support, and care for families facing illness — the work Sylvia did quietly, ward by ward, for most of her life.
Mentorship, free legal guidance, and help navigating the offices and paperwork that stand between ordinary families and what they are owed.
Relief and rebuilding after typhoons, fires, and floods — showing up in the first days, and again in the months when everyone else has gone home.
Mama held my hand for just 39 years, but my heart — she holds forever.
— Atty. Rey M. Gealon
Moments from six decades of family, service, and community in Cebu, Philippines.
Most of what Reynaldo and Sylvia did was never written down. If you carry a memory of them — a kindness, a favour, an evening they made easier — we would be grateful to have it here, in their own family’s hands.