Life and Life Eternal

Not that most Sunday mornings aren't peaceful, but this one was more so than most. You see, we weren't preparing for our weekly, hour-long trek to Iowa City. Instead we were drinking coffee, taking lengthy showers, and calmly getting ready for the 11 o'clock service at a local Catholic parish. It was perhaps because of this relaxing morning, I found myself quite ready to appreciate the beauty of the service we had come to witness, my goddaughter Paige's first communion.

It was truly a wonder to watch the girl who I had held so recently as an infant on the day of her baptism participate in this sacred event. Perhaps because they spent so much of their history in hostile territory, the Orthodox usually pack all three sacraments of initiation - baptism, chrismation, and first communion - into one service. The thought to get them all in before the next Christian purge was probably a practical one, but I also feel it robs children of much needed rights of passage. We need those rites as parents and godparents as well, so we have a moment to truly look and see the little miracles growing up right before eyes.

The parents of my goddaughter have been my close friends from time immemorial, at least immemorial to me. Kim and I have hung out since at least the 5th grade when we were in band together. I knew Doug's name at the time, but only as my cousin's best friend. I think the first time we met was when all our middle schools fed into United Township High School. I still remember when Kim first told me she was dating Doug. I had stopped by her house while out riding my bike. Notice I was riding my bike, not driving a car - we were 15.

This would seem ridiculous, being together from the age of 15, if it were not for the fact that these are two of the kindest and most generous people I know. And they come from two of the kindest, most generous families I know - parents, siblings, nieces, nephews, the whole lot. Whether it was forgiveness when I instigated a school-wide boycot of a chicken lunch painstakingly prepared by Kim's mother (then the lunch lady), dinner when my wife was out of town, fundraisers and donations when we began our journey of adoption, and then more fundraisers and donations when we did it again, or a couch for me to sleep off a hang-over, nearly every member of these two families have shown me and my family some form of hospitality, generosity, and love.

Thus it was that I also understood some of the stifled anguish in the hearts of these two dear families as they fed my boys Oreos and Goldfish crackers, desperately trying to keep my three boys quiet throughout the mass. You see, as we watched this joyous marker in the young life of Kim's daughter, Kim's father was dying in the hospital. The party afterwards, moved at the last minute to Doug's parent's house, was full of honest smiles, wiped tears, and knowing hugs.

Kim's father, Jim, was a good man in the mold that seems to have all but disappeared in the intervening generations. Doug, asked by the family to perform the difficult task of eulogizing his father-in-law, described a man who was a loving husband, a dedicated father, and a caring grandfather. He painted the picture of a man who took his granddaughters on long hikes through the backyard carrying walking sticks with tennis balls on top, "searching for treasures." And at an age when most have become comfortably set in their ways, Jim was apparently still searching for treasures, expanding his musical tastes with a new found love for Jimmy Buffett and struggling with his spirituality.

Having always been a prayerful man, and having raised his children at least nominally Lutheran, it was a dramatic choice when during his last few years here on earth he decided to follow his wife, daughter and brother into the bosom of the Catholic Church. And it was because of this profound choice I found myself at a second Catholic mass in as many weeks. Jim, like his granddaughter the week before, processed down the center aisle wrapped in white. The priest blessed his casket with holy water; this baptism not marking Jim's physical birth but rather his being born again into the presence of the Father.

We returned to the church hall for some refreshments after the service. The hall was full of nurses, teachers, pastors - all people sincerely looking to help those around them. Having my goddaughter surrounded by such a good group of people makes my job as a godfather easy. And to a large extent, I have the man these people called dad, uncle, brother, and grandfather to thank. May his memory be eternal!