tough week

This week two former youth group kids of mine, from two different parishes, passed away. David was 19 years old and died after a long fight with brain cancer. Alex was 17 and collapsed last week after a track meet event and never regained consciousness. It's a stunner hearing about both these deaths in the same week- their deaths were two days apart.
Alex was a sweetheart and though I didn't know him well, he made me smile and I know he was fun to be around and kind. The worst part of this death is the shock of it- he had been accepted to two impressive colleges and was poised to... well, keep living. No one did or could have seen this coming and no one was prepared for it- his life just changed completely, and one week later he died. I imagine he was having a very normal day right up until his meet.
I have known David since he was in middle school- a skinny kid with patchy hair after a serious bout with the cancer that eventually took him. He told us in class one night that he didn't believe in God because God gave him cancer- but that Jesus was okay. I loved his insights into faith, his well-earned cynicism but sure hope. He was sunny and funny and strong. Just before I left his parish, we went on a white-water-rafting retreat. It was a wonderful weekend. After a silent "emmaus walk" in the campground where we stayed, he told us that God had told him that everything was going to be all right. So many of us that night came back from that walk with the same answer from God. Everything would be all right- whatever that meant.
I hope he held onto that over the years. I hope he knew that God didn't give him cancer and that Jesus was even better than okay. I know he knows it now.
So, two wakes and two funerals in one week, for two beautiful young people. Pray with me for their friends and families.

All my exes live in Massachusetts

I realized today that whereas in the 20's I had ex-boyfriends, what I have now is ex-parishes.
I went to a workshop Monday and walked in a bit late, as is our fashion... there weren't any places for both of us to sit down right away, so we stood awkwardly for a bit scanning the room. I saw our intern at the corner table, sitting with all the youth ministry staff from my most recent former parish, along with the current youth minister from my first parish. It was so weird, all of them sitting together- a big blast from my past right there at one table.
I was a bit distracted by this all during the presentation, and wondered if it was weird that I was so... weirded out by their presence. I guess though that it's not the parish walls I've been effected by, but the relationships. So in that way, my weirded-ness seems appropriate. I don't imagine that all the people at that table were discussing me, or even knew their connection in me. I know I'm not a rock star- it meant nothing to any of them, but it sure was striking to me.
Thursday morning I went back to my first parish for a funeral, which was also awkward, but it's been long enough since I left there that the pain that I felt in leaving there has really faded substantially. I was happy to run into a woman that I knew back then, and to sit with her, but she told me that she is no longer a parishioner there. She said she was "forced out" in much the way that I was. It was sad to hear but also affirming- it meant I didn't just imagine the way I was treated back then, by the pastor and parish I loved.
Hey, breaking up is hard to do, but all those bad boyfriends cleared the way for my beloved One, and all those difficult parishes and their painful ends led me to the place I'm in now- a happy home for my soul.