Gratitude for the Greatest Gift
A Personal Message from Gil Bailie
". . . You touch
the door and the road straightens behind you.
It is now. It has all come true."
William Stafford
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Jean-Francois Millet
The Angelus
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Dear Friends,
With a heart full of gratitude, I am writing to share the exceedingly happy news that on Saturday, May 8th, Kathleen Sanglier and I will be married at St. Francis Solano Church in Sonoma, California, surrounded by our families and a few of our closest friends.
Kathleen and I first met in San Diego at the lectures I gave and she attended as part of the Emmaus Road Initiative program.
The news of my remarriage may be as surprising to those who know of my abiding love for my deceased wife Liz as the related move to California is a surprise to those who know how attached I am to St. Joseph's Trappist Abbey -- where Liz and I attended daily Lauds and Mass for many years.
Love never ends, however, as St. Paul reminds us in his great hymn to love, and neither my love for Liz nor my spiritual connection with the monks of Spencer Abbey is in the least diminished by the love that Kathleen and I have for one another, quite the contrary. Whether separated by death or by distance, these existing loves only increase as the heart in which they are lodged is expanded by a love so unforeseen and extraordinary that I haven't the words to express it properly.
Kathleen has lived and worked in the San Diego area all her life, and we will be making our home there, but most of my family and many of my oldest friends live in Sonoma, where the Cornerstone Forum also has its offices. (My youngest Aņa and her husband Mike are still in Massachusetts, but they, too, plan to return to Sonoma within a year or so.) So, once I sell my home in Massachusetts, we hope to find an apartment in Sonoma as well and to spend part of our time there.
In a subsequent newsletter Randy and I will share some thoughts about how this transition coincides with some new opportunities to further the Cornerstone Forum's mission. For now, however, I simply want to express my gratitude to God for the great and unexpected gift of Kathleen's love, as well as to thank you for your many kindnesses, and to ask you to keep us in your prayers.
Most sincerely,
 Kathleen & Gil |
Gil Bailie
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