Message from Mary: Feeling a Loss

We have recently lost members of our parish community. These have been difficult losses, but each loss is difficult. As long as we’re in this realm, and until it’s our time to move on, we will continue to experience losses such as these. Realizing the loss, grieving the loss, and sharing our experience of that loss with family and friends are all necessary processes. I get it. I truly do.

Personally, each time I experience a loss, I think back to the time I lost my mother. In her last days, she quietly, simply, stated: ‘I don’t want to be forgotten.’ In keeping with her wishes I have shared some of her stories, the jokes she shared with me, and I’ve held the truths she held. As long as I live, she will be remembered.

So, let’s pause a moment and think about how we might encourage our own healing. There’s an old adage, that ‘time heals.’ I don’t subscribe to this, but I believe the passage of time provides an interval into which God, or the Holy Spirit, will insert someone onto your life’s path who will help you. So, the takeaway here may be to continue on your path.

And here’s another thought - a few years ago, I ran across a message online: ‘Be the things you loved most about the people who are gone’ (author unknown). Recently, I have lost friends from my college days as well as some close friends and mentors here at St. John’s. So, I sat with that online message for a while, trying to understand how that would work. Now, I try to be a friend to others as they were friends to me. A friend to lean on, someone to help process a conflicting situation, or provide a different perspective, or an ear to hear and acknowledge. Of course, this is only how I’ve proceeded. Each of us will chart our own course.

Going forward, I hope we will share their stories with each other. Surely, there will be times when we’ll shed tears and other times when we’ll share laughter. And, through the sharing of these stories, perhaps good memories will be rekindled, our hearts will be warmed and those we’ve lost will be remembered.