Dear Quentin:

Here is a response to your question to put into words something of my friendship with Virginia. It would be much more difficult to summarize her spirituality. One would almost have to read all the materials you have in order to do that.

Virginia was a "happening" in my life like she was in so many other people's lives. I knew her uncle, Fr. Edgar Cyr, who was my pastor at St. Mary's, Muncie in my seminary years. I met her when she visited her uncle in Muncie.

I really met her at a much deeper level when she had a need to go for her monthly check-up at the hospital. She was attending school at Tipton, Indiana where I happened to be teaching some college courses.

Because she was severely handicapped, she literally had to be carried wherever she went. It was quite a challenge to get her and her wheelchair in my little VW. Over the months, I grew to enjoy her company and her simple wisdom which included an intimate relationship with Jesus and his mother Mary.

I observed her deep pain and confusion when the hospital changed doctors as it often did, since this was a teaching hospital. From month to month she would be given conflicting information as to how best to handle the symptoms of her disease, cerebral palsy. I began to see the pain this caused in her life. I then realized that her life had been filled with conflicting opinions about such important questions as: who would parent her, where would she live, who would support her. She and her brother had literally been on the road since the mother had abandoned the family when Virginia was 4 years old.

I asked her to do two things for me: 1) To start a journal where she could honestly share all that was happening to her - as well as writing the wisdom gained on her journey. 2) To support my ministry as a priest with her prayers and the acceptance of her vocation as God's Hobo. Since no one would accept her into a Catholic religious community, I suggested that she make private vows to live the life of commitment wherever God took her.

As you read these pages of her journal, you will see that she traveled far and deep in a few years. Perhaps you, too, will be moved and touched by her life and her words and she might even be a "happening" in your life as she was in mine.

Her last words to me on the day of her death February 3, 1967 (age 24?) were: "I will love you until you are really able to love!"

Sincerely,

Fr. Keith