Fr Jim Cogley
I didn’t have all the answers to my grandson’s probing questions about death and loss but I still spoke about my experiences of multiple losses and the slow re-emergence process back into life; a life vastly altered by loss. Grief is like standing on shifting sands, nothing stays put. It takes as much time for to mourn as to love. It has to be suffered through, so that love for life after a death can be restored. The person who mourns deeply has, I would say, loved greatly. If we can remain in love even in the violent pain of grief and not become bitter, we can remain in God. I didn’t manage this at all initially. God vanished, I was empty, forsaken, bereft and bereaved. I experienced acutely His absence even though I now know He was never absent.