This week our home is washed in spring solitude and silence after a weekend of heavy hearts and dampened spirits. Our dear Sister Patricia Hanlon has gone to God after being diagnosed with the coronavirus two days earlier. Twenty-four hours after we Sisters were tested for the virus, three positive diagnoses appeared. Although the other two are doing well, Sister Pat suffered breathing distress which worsened quickly and ended in her death two days later.
We who mourn her passing wonder silently and aloud, “What more could we have done to prevent this tragedy?” Each weekday morning, we receive updates from our Director of Care as to the latest security measures from the Ministry of Health. The staff underwent testing and wear masks. Our temperatures are taken afternoon and evening, we practice social distancing, we wear masks when necessary, we wash our hands frequently and sanitize high touch surfaces several times a day.
Sometimes we think that given enough effort, we can control forces beyond ourselves but often we must bow in silence when our best efforts fail to bring us desired results. By now, COVID -19 has had a lasting impact upon most people on the planet. It might be in the form of losing a loved one, caring for a family member in the long process of recovery, watching essential service providers head off to work. People wait anxiously to see if there is money to pay rent, buy food and other necessities. There doesn’t seem to be an end to our anxieties and fears for the future.
The wages of COVID -19 can literally bring us to our knees and maybe that’s the best place to begin to put our lives into perspective. From a position of surrender, we look up to see what is around us, above us and beyond us. We look up to God to uphold us and stretch out our arms to family to enfold us and friends to ennoble us. Together we join with our communities, countries, and continents to face the future and embrace a communion of love and new beginnings in a brighter, more collaborative, renewed world.
-Sister Jean Moylan, csj