My brother Jim has died. More importantly, the father of four wonderful young women and a great young man, who were brought into the world by he and Trish van Dusen McGinty, has died. Brother to my brothers and sister. Son of Jack and Mary of Lynn. And so much more.
This hard word came Wednesday from Baltimore. As family we are spread around the states these days. So phone and Zoom and texts have filled these next days with voices of disbelief, grief and sorrow, shock, and much more. Today has brought a huge rainstorm, the same storm that has covered other places with snow. Here, its drenching rain and massive winds seem to express something of what I, at least, am feeling.
Every life is complex, and many deaths as well. It is the moment we are forced, if we are honest, to begin to seek to understand who a person has been, not to fail to appreciate all the good, and neither to fail to admit failings (which every one of us definitely have). That’s our work, and it’s also the best way to honor our loved one.
There will be a lot to say, and voices to hear, in time to come. We will gather to remember and to pray for Jim soon, but we do not know yet when or where. For now, I remember how he could talk with a person he had just met for five minutes and cement a friendship. I remember how closely he listened one day on the beltway outside DC years ago when I shared with him something of great importance in my life. How well he listened, and with what understanding and compassion he responded.
As is so often the case in our times, we did not always agree on politics and issues and the rest. For sure. But I never felt less than connected at the cellular level to him. Brother is brother. Which is a beautiful thing, and also an exquisite source of pain right now. And for the wonderful humans who are linked to him in so many other ways, the complexity, the pain, the questions, are all there.
There is also in all this, and in all else, the One whose birth we are about to celebrate. I commend my brother with absolute confidence into the hands of Mercy. For two days now, in real pain, I have been comforted by an image that simply came to me of our Mom and Dad with him, hugging him, embracing him, loving him. That’s the goal of all lives, I believe. That’s the finish line.
Jim knew joy and hope and health. He also knew sorrow and desperation and sickness. He knew suffering, and sometimes that suffering touched others as well. That was important, but all of it was, including the joy and the love.
When we were little kids, Jim and I shared a bedroom there at 75 Eastern Avenue in Lynn. Two twin beds. He didn’t go to sleep right away. He wanted to talk. I used to make up stories and tell them with as much expression and verve as I could muster. He would laugh and add his own embellishments. Decades later he remembered the names I made up of some of the characters.
All those stories were big adventures, with challenges and setbacks, losses and victories. But every one of them ended with our going to sleep in that quiet room in security and peace, knowing that after all – after all – after all – we were surrounded by love. That is my prayer for my brother these days, and for the rest of my days.
This is a brief retreat, first time ever at Holy Cross Monastery on the Hudson. A beautiful spot. And real peace.
I’ve been reading words I wrote or quoted from others while I was on retreat, back in the spring of 1998. Some of those words belong to the inimitable Henri Nouwen, of blessed memory. This evening I saw again words I copied out of his book on consolation, written after the death of his mother.
I suppose I should have expected what came this evening. This is my first moment of retreat since Mom’s death last December. Sitting in the monastery church tonight in the minutes before Compline, waves of grief rose up, and many tears. I miss her so much, all the time. Life goes on, to use the phrase she always used, but it’s not ever the same. Evenings are hard, every day. Just at the end of the day. I just want to see her, to hold her hand, to hear her voice again, to kiss her goodnight. All once simple everyday things. Now all of them, impossible.
The other day, before retreat, I found myself thinking of both my parents in their last days. The stories of their going-forth differ. Dad had five weeks of weakness, illness, treatment after his diagnosis with cancer. Mom had an extended period of weakening, an a-symptomatic experience of Covid, and a second positive test just days before her death.
Neither of them complained. Neither ever asked anything resembling, why me, why now. Neither of them spoke negative words. Both seemed to accept the gateway coming near. I remember Dad standing in his hospital room before the mirror, his eyes catching mine as he said of his 72 years, “It’s been a good run,” and repeating the words again. I remember Mom, the afternoon before she died, there with the intake nurse from hospice. Mom lay in bed at 91 years, listened as best she could, responded, and smiled. She smiled gently at this new friend, and at me.
From both of my parents came the same very last words I ever heard them speak in this world. They said, “Thank you.” After all the joy, all the struggle, all the sorrow, all the laughter, it came down to gratitude, to thankfulness. It came down to saying yes to life and to the hope for new life. And the other day, remembering, I thought and prayed: Lord, grant me a share in their strength. Just a portion.
They are forever my heroes.
Henri Nouwen, so many years after his own death, speaks to me tonight in my own handwriting from 1998, these words he wrote in contending with death as his own mother went forth from this world:
Our lives can indeed be seen asa process of becoming familiar with death, as a school in the art of dying. … When we see life constantly relativized by death, we can enjoy it for what it is:a free gift.
Mother’s death is indeed an invitation to surrender ourselves more freely to the future, in the conviction that one of the most important parts of our lives may still be ahead of us and that mother’s life and death were meant to make this possible.
Yes, a silent, joyful waiting. No panic, no despair, no screams, no tears or wringing of hands. No shouts of joy either. No victorious songs, no banners or flags. Only a simple quiet waiting with the deep, inner knowledge that all will be well. How? Do not ask. Why? Do not worry. Where? You will know. When? Just wait. Just wait quietly, peacefully, joyfully … all will be well.
[H. Nouwen, A Letter of Consolation]
And so, I wait.
Together in IrelandHenri Nouwen and family (Nouwen Society)
Believe it. 