Today is a rather momentous day in the history of the Catholic Church in the last century. It was on this day that Blessed John Paul II was shot by an assassin in 1981; the Turk who killed him would be forgiven upon the Pontiff's waking from surgery. The man would later be imprisoned again for someone else's murder.
It was also on this day in 1917, that three shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal would receive their first vision of the Blessed Virgin. Blessed John Paul II would remark upon this, saying that it was she who saved his life, and would make a pilgrimage in 1982 to Fatima to place a bullet fired at him in the crown of the statue of Our Lady of Fatima, where it still resides today.
It could be said that Blessed John Paul II's life began anew after his brush with death. So to, do I wonder, if mine is also? I got my grades; I passed all of my classes. I've officially survived my first year as a PhD student!! I was mulling over though, how I'm so alone; then lo and behold, a person I always liked but was too afraid to really do anything about it has started talking to me after almost two years of silence, it gives me hope even if nothing comes of it.
But, there are other things too. My grandma's been given about a month to live. She's been enrolled in hospice for comfort care; and seeing her this week I've been home for a mini vacation has been painful. She's always just kept going, no matter what...and now she's finally reached the point where nothing will help. It hurts, but I know when she passes, she will begin anew in Heaven.
I can't fear the future, I have to embrace it, wherever it takes me.
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