Have you ever known someone, or known of them, who emit an inner light that shines through even the most adverse conditions? I have, several in fact. Sadly, one of those lights faded this past Sunday. It shon through a young man from my church. I can’t say I knew Ryan, but I felt I knew him. I remember him when he was a small child at my former church. In those days he his muscular dystrophy had not yet settled him in a wheelchair, but you could see it was working on him. Many years later when I joined my current church, a new parish in the diocese, his family joined as well. As church habits tend to go, we each had our own sections, and I usually faced him from my seat in my section. So many times I watched him, not in a creepy way, but in a Guardian Angel way, not that I’m calling myself an angel by any means. I just watched him to see how he was doing. I felt ready to leap to action if action was needed. In reality I would probably run at the first sign of trouble, a weakness of my character. And in reality my help was never needed. His mom had it covered. She instinctively knew when to adjust his position, when to move his head to make him more comfortable. So many times in my watch I prayed for him. You could say I prayed over him from a distance. I prayed for a miraculous healing and envisioned him rising from his wheelchair and walking to communion. I prayed for strength and patience for his parents who I know were much stronger than I, but still needed every prayer that headed their way.
A couple of years ago I was watching again at our Good Friday service. This is the day when we have a Veneration of the Cross observance and those who desire may walk to the altar to touch or kiss the cross in reverence for Christ’s passion. When it was Ryan’s row’s turn to process to the altar Ryan took off at breakneck speed, or at least as fast as his chair could go, and made a beeline to the cross. When his mom caught up with him she lifted his hand and placed it on the cool wood. I lost it. Here was a young man who couldn’t even lift his own hand, who had such a love for Jesus and his Catholic faith that no disability was going to keep him from that cross! In contrast, my own perfectly able-bodied sons probably didn’t even know it was Good Friday. The beauty of Ryan’s faith, and the irony of everything hit me hard that night, and I had to slip off to the restroom to dry the tears and compose myself.
The miraculous healing I prayed for never came to fruition. My plans were not God’s as so often is the case. Ryan passed this life on Sunday still unable to walk or lift his own hand. There are some people in this life that I believe have an inside track to heaven without even having to ask. I believe Ryan was one of those blessed people. I’ve seen hundreds of photos of his smiling face on Facebook in the last few days. Those how knew him best will surely remember him that way. For me, I choose to remember the image of him on that Good Friday night, his hand on the cross, his mother’s hand on his.
