By Sister Genevieve Sache, OSB

Last weekend I drove over to our motherhouse in Alabama to attend the funeral of one of our sisters. The countryside provided a forceful mediation on the themes of Life, Death, and Resurrection celebrated in this weeks’ Liturgy.

The magnificence of the dogwood and fruit tree blossoms scattered through the woods, which were themselves a mosaic of multiple shades of green of the early foliage, contrasted starkly with the devastation of the nine tornados which crossed that highway alone. I had no way of knowing if there had been loss of life in any of these areas of wreckage but I could see families laboring to clear debris from farms and dwellings.

I noted one man in a particular standing before his home and staring into the lane of trees uprooted and torn which indicated that the funnel cloud had been moving directly towards his house and then amazingly it had lifted and settled down once more into the timber not 300 yards on the other side of the building. I knew instinctively that this man had come to a whole new concept and appreciation of life.

Others, not so fortunate, must deal in another way with the mystery of suffering and death for which there is no rational answer—only faith can provide the meaning.

As I drove in Cullman I was appalled to see that another tornado had cut a path between our convent and the abbey almost a mile away sparing few homes and businesses in its path. Again the instinctive question—why are some spared while others, no less good or evil, are stricken?

All these thoughts were still whirling in my mind as I entered our chapel for the funeral a few minutes later. Then a new theme was set as I viewed the casket and noted the unmistakable smile. The prioress went to the lectern to welcome the guest, the clergy, the many other sisters who had also come, and the few relatives who were able to attend; they were told that a celebration had begun, and a celebration it was!

Here was an 80 year-old woman who had completed the work God has destined for her to do – and work she had done!

As a young woman she had come South to do mission work and joined our fledgling community which had not been established for very long itself. Sister “retired” after almost 50 years of teaching primary grades and took up a new occupation of tending the flowers on our huge campus and on rainy days and evenings she crocheted hundreds of items for gifts and for sale for our support.

Perhaps what impressed me the most was her energy and her joy, the kind of joy that pervades one’s being and communicates itself in a very real form of witness, despite the fact that she, like all of us, had good days and bad days. It was this joy which was so evident at her funeral.

In that realization, I also had the answer to some of the questions I had asked earlier. I said above that life and death only have meaning in faith. As I stood and celebrated her new life with the Lord, I knew I was celebrating with a faithful community of women whose very reason for being who we are is our public profession and witness that there is more to life that what we see and experience now.

Our celibacy proclaims a belief in an eternity in which “there will be neither marriage nor giving in marriage” (Mk. 12:25) for our God is not a “god of the dead but of the living.”

This woman’s life as religious, teacher, friend, and a hundred roles, gave witness, as does the life of every true Christian, that because of the Life, Death, and Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, humanity has been transformed and given a meaning which transcends anything we can know within the few years of our experience here on this planet.

In times of tragedy and plenty alike, we need to know and to be reminded of this fact. This is one reason why I believe religious life is still very relevant today—especially at Easter!