Lynn Stout’s passing has got me thinking about my own mortality. She was just about 18 months older than I am, after all.
I can’t help wondering if she was ready for eternity (not mine to judge, of course), which called to mind my need to reflect on where I am in my own spiritual journey.
Like all Catholics, I have the hope of salvation. And I believe that’s the theologically correct position. But at times like this I miss the simple “blessed assurance” of sola fide, which I enjoyed in my Protestant youth.
Instead, as a Catholic, a passing is a wake up call. First, to honor and remember the friend by praying for the repose of their soul. Second, to evaluate my own inner spiritual life and then seek Reconciliation. Third, to commit some act of charity in remembrance of the friend. Fourth, to bear up the living in love and prayer. To reach out to those we have wronged or who have wronged us and be reconciled.
This latter seems most significant today, because Lynn and I had our differences and they had weighed on our friendship in recent years. I never took the step of seeking to heal those breaches so that the full flower of our first friendship would be restored and, now, I regret that very much.
So the second of the great commandments looms very large in my thoughts at the moment. May it be my guiding principle for however much time I have left.