Healing Love
It was Holy Week and we were coming in hot from another intense Lenten season. Our family had received some challenging news two days before, and we were all still reeling quite a bit. But, we were just upon the Triduum, my favorite three-day stretch, so I had renewed hope.
As I was driving to an appointment that Holy Thursday morning, my phone rang and it was my mom. I quickly sent it to voicemail and three seconds later, it rang again. I hurriedly parked the van and answered the phone. My heart was not ready for her news.
Through choked sobs and half-sentences my mom shared that her 91-year-old father, my beloved Papa, had passed away unexpectedly. He was in perfect health, living independently, so we were all devastated. All my life he had been my biggest cheerleader, loving me so well.
I canceled my appointment, called my husband and shared the news and told him there was one stop I needed to make before coming home.
At the time, Dominican Sisters lived just around the corner from us, across the street from our two Catholic schools. I pulled into the convent driveway faster than I should have and marched straight to the front door. The Sisters had seen me coming and held the door open as I fell into their arms, sobbing. We all made our way to the convent chapel. As I knelt before the tabernacle, one Sister took her place beside me, while three others laid their hands on my shoulders and head, and we all prayed and wept together.
Quite literally, they sat with me in my grief, and it was easily one of the most profoundly moving spiritual experiences of my life. To really be held, seen, and loved on one of my hardests days reshaped me. Those Sisters were like firefighters, running straight into the blaze of suffering and pain with me. It was beautiful and it was hard.
As I dried my tears after going through an entire box of tissues, one of them grasped me by the shoulders. She taught one of my children, so she knew our family in a special way. “No one loves you as completely as a grandparent,” she said lovingly.
Sometimes we don’t see how God heals us until we look back, but in that moment, I was given a glimpse of what it must’ve been like for Jesus to be held by His mother. These Sisters have given me new eyes for Mary, the mother of Jesus, allowing me to love them both with even greater depth. Jesus never wastes a moment to show us His love and for me, it came in the arms of a Dominican sister.
