Death takes us by surprise
And stays our hurrying feet;
The great design unfinished lies,
Our lives are incomplete.
-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
4:00 a.m. on All Souls’ Day, November 2, a day for remembering and honoring the loved ones we lost, as prescribed by the Catholic church. There are other days and reasons for doing this, as any day can be one of remembrance, but today has been officially designated for prayers for those referred to as our “faithful departed” and for offering Masses.
In a sane and logical world, my son should be the one offering prayers for me. Instead its me who shall pray for him. No, that’s not right either. He doesn’t need our prayers as he died before reaching what is considered “the age of accountability” and therefore, by Catholic doctrine, died in a state of grace and went straight to heaven. He was just six years old, a few weeks short of his 7th birthday, and would have been a teenager by now. I will go to early Mass and then visit his grave with his mother and sisters. Prayers will be said, but more for our sake, those he left behind.
We miss him so much, and the years have not dulled the pain of loss. The grief becomes sharper on days like this. He was the center of our lives. On my side of the family, out of thirteen grandchildren (and more on the way), he was the only boy. And so I feel, like many a grieving parent, stripped of my past and robbed of my future. Read the rest of this entry »