Model and actress Olalla Oliveros has left the entertainment industry and joined the semi-cloistered Order of Saint Michael in Spain, after testifying that she wanted to devote her life to Jesus.
Oliveros, who has appeared on Spanish television shows and commercials, told reporters that she felt called to the ministry after visiting Fatima, Portugal.
The Sanctuary of Fatima is one of the most famous Catholic shrines in the world, and many travel to the parish to pray in the monuments to Jesus and Mary. Oliveros described the experience as an "earthquake" in her life.
She said that she kept visualizing herself as a nun, and realized that God was speaking to her.
"He asked if I will follow Him, and I could not refuse," she told the National Catholic Register.
Her former agent, Mirella Melero, told Argentine blog El Diario de Carlos Paz that Oliveros had just recently been cast in a movie when she experienced her spiritual awakening.
Oliveros' story, although interesting, is not unique. In 2005, top Colombian model Amada Rosa Pérez also disappeared from the limelight and dedicated her life to Christ.
"I always sought answers and the world never gave them to me," she told Colombian newspaper El Tiempo in a 2010 interview.
"Being a model means being a benchmark, someone whose beliefs are worthy of being imitated, and I grew tired of being a model of superficiality.
"I grew tired of a world of lies, appearances, falsity, hypocrisy and deception, a society full of anti-values that exalts violence, adultery, drugs, alcohol, fighting, and a world that exalts riches, pleasure, sexual immorality and fraud."
She began working with the Roman Catholic Marian community, and says she now has a sense of peace.
"I want to be a model that promotes the true dignity of women and not their being used for commercial purposes," she said.
"Now I live in peace; the world doesn't appeal to me. I enjoy every moment the Lord gives me."
