Kirstin Paisley
Rob was a soft-spoken, gentle soul, with the driest sense of humor on the planet. Easter before last, I was serving. I was wearing an alb, and carrying a torch. We were singing "My Jesus Rose." I forgot what I was wearing, and what I was holding, and clapped my hands--thus getting wax all over me.
I was slinking around, looking for an Altar Guild member to confess to, when I bumped into Rob. I asked him, "Now what should I do?" He answered me quietly and completely deadpan, save for a twinkle in his eye:
"Well, you're going to hell now."
I'm still working at the Ranch, and couldn't participate in the vigil that the community kept for him. But everyone who reported back to me told me that he was surrounded by love. People from our community took two-hour shifts, around the clock, to be with him. Jack played his harp for him. The Brothers were with him. His nieces were with him.
Last night, after he died, Ken and Jenny went to Kate and Angela's. They connected me by speaker phone, and we all read Compline for Rob. This impulse to pray--and their desire to figure out a way to include me after I sobbed on the phone that I needed people to pray with--is a piece of the love we all share. The same love that celebrated with me at our parish weekend, when I got up and told a story, completely confidently and without ever once tripping over my mouth.
I know what lifted Rob as he left us. And I know that same beam of light would be focused on any of us in a millisecond, if we needed it.
I remain in awe.
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3 comments:
I am Fr. Rob's niece, Mary Rhudy. Of course, to me he was Uncle Rob. I was heartbroken that I couldn't be with him when he died, but I have no job and no money, and there wasn't anyway for me to get out there. I cried after I read Kirsten's story about her mishap with the candle. That is classic Uncle Rob. He used to always send me the absolute funniest birthday cards, and I know he had to either have a sixth sense for where the truly egregiously cheesy ones were, or he spent days hunting for the perfect ones. I am comforted by knowing that he is a new creation through Jesus Christ and is no longer in any pain. Also, I know that God has one hell of a good prayer warrior, now, and that when Uncle Rob prays for something, by God it stays prayed for. It does my heart good to know how well loved he was and still is. As long as he is remembered by people who love him and who try to live the way he tried to live - following the One Way, the Truth, and the Life - then he will always be with us praying and fighting right along side of us. PRAISE BE TO GOD!!!
I met Fr. Rhudy almost 50 years ago in Alva, OK. He was Vicar at a mission church,now long closed, on the flat, windy land close to the panhandle. I was a student at the State College, and Fr. Rhudy prepared me for Confirmation in the Episcopal Church--I remember a loving, generous soul of self-sacrifice, even then.
I was only there for a year, but he kept in touch for a long time, sending pictures of the "trailer chapel" he had arranged for serving even smaller parishes in that lonely place,and some which well illustrated an ordination at which he served. He was already well acquainted with disappointment by and from those who turned their backs upon him; I think his soul must have been being prepared for the work he was doing even at his death, from what you have written on this blog. He lived for those he served. He was still caring for his mother, and the town resented that they loved him, for he was part of the hated "Catherlick" people who could not be understood, and from which even his shadow one must protect oneself. He was equally at home with the lawyer and college professors, with the struggling people who never could get life to work for them, no matter how hard they tried. He sent for those he had known before, who were broken by circumstances which had overwhelmed them, and gave them a new start, in the clean wind of the small panhandle (almost) town. No sinner was excluded.
I lost touch over forty years ago, but never forgot him. I tried to search for him on the internet, but to no avail, for many years. Then I found him in California, after regular rounds of Googling, several times a year. I felt comforted knowing that he was still in this world, and still doing his work.
I thought of him often, and prayed for him; and on the 29th suddenly thought, I wonder if I can find Fr. Rhudy? And I did, to my surprise. And I was stunned. I found his obituary, and then later I found this website. He was not here. He had gone to his Father's house. And this world was diminished.
I am so grateful that he found love, acceptance, and respect; that his family was close to him, that he was not so deeply "alone". His smile I remember, his listening eyes, little gestures, the eyebrow that lifted all by itself, and the air of wistfulness that would drift up, seemingly from the depths of his soul, longing for something he was missing, for something he hadn't yet found. It is a comfort that you all gave him a place to belong, a place to be loved. Thank you.
Bettie Cholakian
Bartlesville, OK
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