Loyola College - Review Yearbook (Montreal, Quebec Canada)

Page 8 text:

Micheal, Katye, John, Martin, Bridgette, and Susan; friends enjoying dinner. ..cCan we understand it (death) less in the lives of these four young Loyola people and their two young friends. Everyone speaks of their intense involvement with life. Micheal and Martin displayed this publicly in their treatment of the News. John showed this intensity with the enthusiasm for his new life- in his studies, friends and also in the News oOffice...(a mecca for people with this zest for life). Katye perhaps in a quieter way glowed with this inner security with the goodness of life and was always gently and joyfully sharing it with others. With all of them, it seemed that this overwhelming sense of the greatness of life filled them too, with a great sen- sitivity and gentleness, that as Micheal said so beautifully “Like Stars - they’re always great up there, even when over- cast”. Why do young people die? Maybe we should ask why they live? Maybe like Christ who lived such a wholly human existence and yet - insisted that He must go, in order that we might catch the wind of his spirit. Yet many of us as we pass Our prime, we start measuring out life -- How much do | have left? or we put a lid on it like preserves - and almost forget about living. Maybe that is why they die. We can’t stand so much life - or maybe - to show us in our shadows that our lights still shine too. St. Ireneus says: “The glory of God is man fully alive”. Maybe that’s why they were called to this gift of intense life.... to see ourselves anew. That we are all one... that the bell tolls for me and you and | must get on with living full - through.. these deaths.. then we might reach through to our centers. Maybe touch that vital core and spark it to new life in

Page 7 text:

autumn come sudden one day chip winds and chill thinned the summer suit dog clouds schooned full with swangrace curling leaves rushed into colour buck breezes looted the stick-branches whetted men awoke to bristly days and warm indoors adventured the every thing restless season-wise they noted winter’s hand Micheal O’Hearn (September 22, 74) a 2 A Edito; ps ria)

Page 9 text:

us. Regenerate our own personal mystery for just as Christ says “| have come that you might have life and have it more abundantly - but to do so, we must be ready to die- that is ready to open ourselves to wonder and the fulness of life - their deaths because it was a life lived resurrectionally. We cannot only look forward to their ressurrection in Christ - but maybe live as they did - as ressurrected men and women today i.e. ready to heal, to die a little with them, but always to see the light, to live again in a new way. This doesn’t soften greatly our sorrow or anger - even Christ realized this after his question, Do you believe? He wept with his friends. Let us try to ellicit in our hearts “thanks to God” for that precious gift that these young people were to all of us, a gift that we only realized how precious it was, now that they are gone. Let us accept the gift they leave, reach out like them to the center of our lives and say Yes to it. So that we might be carried by its power to affirm life, to say no, to non-life, to non-freedom, that is sin and death. That’s their gift, it’s still ours to live. ... Eulogy, Rev. R. Nagy Nov. 28, 1974. Requiem Mass held November 28, 1974. Father Nagy officiating.