A Greater Good

 It has been more than 7 years since you died and I have seemingly appeared consigned to your absence and the inevitable emptiness is once again filled with purpose and meaning.  The road that took me from that day of loss to where I am now is not an easy one.  At times, I faltered in my resolve.  In other powerful moments, I felt strong enough to move on and maybe conquer the world.

My life today is different.  Maybe because there are other roles to play and this is a different stage altogether.  It's more than that.  I am a different person.  Outwardly, I have succumbed to the ravages of aging but my interior life is much more robust than mere physicality displays.  When you died, I took stock little by little what this all meant.

I couldn't say then that a greater good came out of loss.  Now, I see with a new perspective that it was the beginning of something new.  My response to your death was to go back to church, to the ways of my childhood memories, when I believed with all my heart that God has a greater purpose in my life.  I found God again without the distractions from this earthly life.

You were not a distraction.  You fulfilled a different purpose in me - to be a wife and mother.  You showed me the vanity of this passing life.  You always told me that none of these things we call 'treasure' will ever be part of our spiritual existence.  But your spirituality did not fully explain what belonging to God's church does to the soul.  At the end of your earthly life, you embraced the Catholic faith and received the sacraments.  It moved me to see the church as the bastion, the stronghold of God's truth.

Lord, sometimes it is difficult to see through the tears, the pain, sadness, and emptiness of losing somebody we love.  But there is a greater good if at the end of this lugubrious journey the road leads back to you.