Conversation with Mary – April 2024
Life and Resurrection
As Christians we believe in life after death—Resurrection. This can only come from a deep faith in the teachings of Jesus. In her letter to her mother Flora, when her brother John died in New Zealand, Mary MacKillop comforts her mother with thoughts of the new life John is now experiencing. John had returned to New Zealand, followed by a young woman from Penola. After a fall from a horse, John developed tetanus and died a week later. The young woman organised his funeral and wrote to his sister Maggie to tell her what had happened. Some years ago some of the Sisters went looking for his grave and found the gravestone under a tree.
“May our blessed Lord Himself be your comforter in the new and severe trial. He has taken our dear John, but ah, how thankful we should be to know that the poor boy’s death was so holy and happy one. How different would be our feelings had it been otherwise. My one constant prayer for those I love is that, …God in his mercy may grant them a happy death and give them that happiness in the next world… “ 7th January 1868—Adelaide
“Let us not mourn for John. We may safely hope that he is not far from his loving Redeemer. His wishes were always good and his life innocent. You have not got him to comfort and take care of on earth but from heaven he and our little Alick will watch over you and all of us I trust.” (Alick was a little brother, who died at 11 months)
IN SILENCE REFLECT ON THE LOSS OF A LOVED ONE HOW DID YOU COMFORT YOURSELF AND OTHERS?
WAS THERE HOPE IN YOUR GRIEVING? WHAT ARE YOUR FEELINGS NOW?
IN YOUR MIND SIT BY MARY’S TOMB. TALK TO MARY MACKILLOP ABOUT YOUR THOUGHTS.
LISTEN TO WHAT SHE MAY SAY TO YOU…
PSALM 22: from Psalms Now by Leslie Brandt
The Lord is my constant companion,
There is no need that he cannot fulfil
Whether his course for me points
To the mountaintops of glorious joy
Or to the valleys of human suffering
He is by my side, he is every present with me.
He is close beside me
When I tread the dark streets of danger,
And even when I flirt with death itself,
he will not leave me.
When the pain is severe, he is near to comfort.
When the burden is heavy, he is there to lean upon.
When depression darkens my soul
He touches me with eternal joy.
When I feel empty and alone,
He fills the aching vacuum with his power.
My security is in his promise to be near me always
And in the knowledge
that he will never let me go.
Conversations with Mary - April 2024 