I have another post by this title (I think that one may be "on Death, and Life") but once again I am at a tangled crossroads where I have seen the Lord give and the Lord take away. I have a new niece, named for "Mary the Dawn", who gave rise to the Son of Justice. I got to hold her for many good long moments after our Thanksgiving feast. A beautiful new life that weighed so little I wasn't quite sure I had her tight!
My best friend lost her husband this week. I'm not going to tell that story, it's not really mine to share, but it impacted our lives...more drastically than I would have anticipated. Of course, he was not only my best friend's husband, but my husband's best friend.
My friend and I met in high school. We both had judged each other by appearances (negatively) and I'm not sure we ever spoke (I was like that in high school. She was just more reserved). One serendipitous moment in a bathroom led us into a conversation that would change my opinion of that girl, and change my life forever. It wasn't a deep, meaningful conversation. We had been surprised by Christmas gifts that the most popular girl in school decided to gift each girl in our class with. We both felt a bit "pegged" by the gifts received. My friend had received a stuffed teddy bear, as I recall. Her reaction was priceless! She made me laugh until I cried. It would be the first of many many laugh-til-I-cried laughs.
I'm pretty sure she was my best friend from that moment forward. She convinced me to go to the college I went to. She convinced me that the guy I had a crush on all through high school was not the right guy for me. She convinced me to date my future husband. She was right at every turn. I've regretted nothing that I took her advice on.
When my Father-in-Law passed away, we drove the 1800 miles home from New Mexico as my youngest sister went into labor, and then delivered my nephew (ironically named for the patron Saint of safe travels) as we crossed the border into our home state. Death, and life.
Here again, the week preceding Thanksgiving was a week of mourning with those who mourn. I almost missed my niece's Baptism. But I made it, and rejoiced with those who rejoice, as we welcomed my sweet niece into the family of the Church. I helped her mom slip her tiny body into her Baptismal gown. Three days later I saw the white funeral pall slipped over the coffin by the parents who had once dressed their son for his Baptism.
Ashes to ashes.
That white robe, the white burial cloth, and the white robe we will be clothed in on the Final Day, if in God's Mercy we obtain the reward of Eternal Life.
Intertwined, life and death. Death and Resurrection.
Somehow, somewhere in the midst of all of this is joy, and peace. It is in the Hope of the promise of eternal life. Trust in His love and mercy.
Tomorrow is the first day of the new Liturgical Year, the first Sunday of Advent. I pulled my ratty old Advent wreath up from the basement. We look for the coming of our Redeemer. The God who so loved the world that He gave His only Son so that whoever might believe in Him might not die, but have eternal life.
We prepare for His coming now, but also every day until He does come for us. I strive to wait in peace, hope, trust, faith...joy. He was that infant, tiny, fragile, so beautiful. His also was the cold face of death, taken too soon, buried by His Mother.
He is where that tangled crossroads becomes a straight path. It is a path that leads us beside still water and allows us to lie down in green pastures. He shepherds us, spreads our table before us, anoints us with oil. He restores our soul.
He guides our feet in the way of peace.
The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the Name of the Lord!
Come, Lord Jesus!
