%1

The 2021 movie Belfast is set in Northern Ireland in 1969. Buddy, a nine-year-old Protestant boy, has a crush on a Catholic classmate. He asks his father if he could have a future with her, and his father replies, “That wee girl can be a practicing Hindu, or Southern Baptist, or vegetarian Anti­christ. But if she’s kind, and fair, and you two respect each other, she and her people are welcome in our house.”

It was a Wednesday night, August 8, 2012. I was on call as a chaplain resident, taking a nap at my parents’ home, when my mother’s scream jarred me awake. I ran to my parents’ bedroom to see my mother holding my father, who had suddenly collapsed. She pleaded for me to call 911. Hours later, I sat in a room with her, my daughter, and an ER physician as he broke the news that my father had died, and life changed forever.