Test of faith pushed to the limit
RENVY is one of the seven deadly sins, so I suppose I’m in double trouble when I admit to being envious of those who believe there is a God and have complete faith in Him. Why envious? Because of the deep comfort such a belief can bring. I only wish I had access to it, but alas, it eludes me.
I witnessed the power of faith at first hand when my mother was dying.As I have written here before, on her very last day on Earth, as she lay drifting in and out of consciousness, my mother suddenly squeezed my hand and asked me: “What did my mother look like?” (Mum had moderate dementia and had forgotten).
I never met my maternal grandmother – she died when I was small – but I did my best and described her from family photos.
My mother nodded in relief and recognition. “Of course,” she said.
“Why do you want to know, mum?”
“Well, when I get up there” – she managed to point, very weakly, at the ceiling – “they’ll all be waiting for me. I can remember father, and my brothers, but I couldn’t remember mother. It would have been so embarrassing… but now I will. Thank you.”
Imagine that! To know you are so very close to the end, but to be calmly certain you will pass through some sort of veil or portal and be reunited with long-lost loved ones. It certainly removed all fear of death from my mother. When she passed a few hours later, it was in serenity and unquestioning confidence in a life hereafter.
But faith has many other crucial services to carry us over and through the worst of times. I saw that again this week, this time in the Good Morning Britain TV studios.
Susanna Reid and I were talking to Mina Smallman, the UK’s first black, female archdeacon.
Mina, of course, was mother to Bibaa Henry and Nicole Smallman, brutally murdered in 2020 after a modest birthday celebration in a London park. Their killer, Danyal Hussein, 19, had – in his own sick mind – entered a pact with the Devil. He’d actually drawn up a contract, signed in his own blood, which promised that the Devil would ensure Hussein won the lottery if he killed two innocent strangers.
Could you forgive a monster who did that to your beloved daughters? Mina has – thanks to her faith in God. She told us forgiveness has freed her; allowed her to carry on and not sink into a permanent, never-ending pit of utter despair.
Hussein is of course now in jail, as are two police officers who took photographs of the sisters’ bodies at the crime scene and, disgustingly, shared them on WhatsApp.
I asked Mina if she’d forgiven them, too. She ruefully shook her head.
“I’m only human,” she replied. “Not yet. I’m working on it.”
So even a faith as strong as Mina’s has limitations. But we can forgive her that, can’t we?