tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25740524.post271058994834490138..comments2024-03-11T13:16:19.098-04:00Comments on Ad Orientem: Sad NewsUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25740524.post-21046708743309628632009-02-05T20:17:00.000-05:002009-02-05T20:17:00.000-05:00How horrible! The world is full of misery -- it al...How horrible! The world is full of misery -- it always was and it always will be.<BR/><BR/>I have been doing a fair amount of genealogical research lately, and I have found much that is disconcerting . . . ancestors and their kin who suffered greatly and others who did terrible things. Just yesterday, I discovered that my great grandmother's brother was sent to an insane asylum and then to a wretched prison for the criminally insane (and we know what sort of institutions they were back then). He was widowed (perhaps from his own doing) and died childless in an institution. Looking at records from his childhood and from his vicious old age, I wonder how did it all happen. What a loss.<BR/><BR/>Though, it is a loss of a different kind when someone who "lived a good life" dies, especially when such a person, like Dubruiel, has young children. It is nauseating, nonetheless.<BR/><BR/>I know that our faith teaches divine providence and the hope of the resurrection, but I do not consider them. I do not want to beguiled by the possibility of wishful thinking. Of course, debilitating despair isn't much of an option, either. Unthinking retreats from reality are more like my foolish way of dealing with reality. When the mist dissipates for a moment, I am reminded how vile the universe can be. Beautiful but fleeting is all being . . .Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com