We are a nation of communities. We take what is common about us and use it to identify ourselves as being part of a people, a place. As communities, we take joy in the things that mark us out. When our community is marked out in terms of sport and achievement, we take pride in walking behind that banner. Success for our communities, our villages, our towns is marked by the satisfaction it gives us.
It is this sense of who we are and what we are that enables us all to contribute and enjoy society.
But then, as as communities, we also come together to grief. The loss of someone, or several. We feel their loss as parents, as friends, as family. When there are times of great sadness, we recoil from the shock, but then recover and come together to offer support to those who have been bereaved.
This week, we are in the latter mode, following the dark news last Saturday morning that three young men had lost their lives in tragic circumstances overnight. We are in communal shock at the extent of the tragedy, and the loss of three young men at the cusp of their entry to manhood.
This week, the community that is Galway and the one that is Graiguenamanagh in Kilkenny is in unbearable pain at the horrific loss of three young men — Christopher Stokes, Wojcjek Panek and John Keenan who have all been taken right at the moment when they are discovering what it was they had to give.
Crossing the threshold to maturity, they have been cruelly taken away in circumstances that are unimaginable to countenance.
Speaking at the funeral mass for John Keenan yesterday (Wednesday ), Fr Kevin Blade spoke of the devastation in the parish at his death and of those of Christopher and Wojcieck.
“There are occasions in life when no words seem fitting, when we enter total sadness and desolation, when we are numbed speechless.”
How right he was. Today Christopher and Wojcieck will be laid to rest in the city and in Kilkenny respectively where there will be similar disbelief at what has just happened.
For communities of parents, the passing of a child is something from which you never recover. There is no tragedy in life like the death of a child. As if it is not the natural order of things. For three families last weekend, that horror became a reality.
Grief is the price we all pay for love. It is never something you get over. It’s something that walks beside you every day.
All three were on the edge of making their mark in the world. They had represented their communities, their families, their friends in being who they were. In sport, in their skills, in their personalities.
To the three families of Christopher, Wojcieck and John, we extend our shoulder of support for them to lean on this week and hope they find strength bear the pain.
Since the turn of the year, nine people have lost their lives in motor-related incidents in Galway. Every week there is tragedy, in different shapes, some public, some private. There are those of you out there now reading this and suffering your own heartache. Please know that we would like to bear some of your pain.
We also think of the emergency services who attended this scene, and who are faced with such tragedy on a more regular basis than the rest of us. Your important work and your risking of your lives, so we can live ours, is much appreciated.
