Help keep Christine Archibald’s memory alive
Re: “In grief, make the world better,” editorial, June 6.
All too often these days, we are reading and hearing about senseless tragedies half a world away; we are momentarily sorry for the loss of life, and then we go on with our own. Sometimes, though, the tragedy becomes personal. Such is the case for me with the most recent London terrorist attack, in which Christine Archibald was killed.
Forty years ago this August, I was an attendant at the wedding of Greg and Barb Archibald, having gone through teacher training at the University of Victoria with both of them. They then moved to Castlegar, Greg’s hometown, and settled down to teach at local elementary schools and raise three beautiful daughters.
They did everything right — by example, these parents demonstrated to their children the value of helping those in need, so that, in addition to participating in all the normal childhood activities, as they grew into adulthood, Christine and her twin, Caroline, decided to commit themselves to service to others, through working at a homeless shelter and a career in nursing, respectively.
We are seeing media reports about people like Christine with depressing frequency — people leading anonymous, blameless and, in some cases, exceptional lives, until their tragic deaths propel them out of anonymity for a brief spell. Her name was read out in the House of Commons on Monday, and a moment of silence was observed for her by the prime minister and all the members of Parliament. Chrissy would have been absolutely stunned; she was such a quiet, humble girl.
As we read in the editorial, in the midst of their grief, and prior to flying to London to console her fiancé and to bring their daughter home, Barb and Greg acted with the strength and selflessness that so characterized their murdered daughter’s life by sending out a message to all of us to remember Christine, not just for a moment, but for a lifetime, by giving of oneself in service to others, especially the defenceless and the less fortunate. That act speaks to the quality of the Archibald family’s collective character.
We here in Canada are so blessed; we have won the lottery of life simply by virtue of having been born here, or by having been able to move here and been adopted into the Canadian family. We are so busy with our lives that we tend to forget that we are the envy of most of the rest of the world. We should never take our freedoms and blessings for granted; Christine certainly didn’t.
If her life and death have touched you in any way, please think about doing what you can to help others, as she did. There are many ways to help others besides volunteering at food banks and serving meals to the homeless. If you decide that making a donation to a charity is your best option, then when you do, please put the hashtag #Chrissysentme on the memo line.
In whatever way you choose to help those in need, showing love to strangers, it will keep Chrissy’s memory alive and help make the world a bit better place — in other words, it will have the opposite intent of those who took her life. Wouldn’t you want that, if it had been your child on that bridge? Out of great evil can come great good.