Y’all.
YOU NEED TO BE READY TO DIE.
ALWAYS AND EVERYWHERE.
It doesn’t matter if you are a popular bazzilionare, with a helicopter, a private jet, multiple mansions. If you did not make certain to prepare for a well-provided death, you ain’t got jack.
I pray that everyone on board was ready.
The story is still developing. Kobe was a Philly boy, and I know grown women back home who are crying right now. It’s big news.
Get yourself right with the Lord. Repentance and penance. Use this as a teachable moment with loved ones. Stop what you’re doing right now and say a decade of the Rosary for Kobe, his family, and you and your family. The Fourth Glorious Mystery is Mary’s Assumption into Heaven. Fruit of the mystery is a well provided death. Amen.
Father Z has a few words about it HERE.
A subitanea et improvisa morte, libera nos, Domine.
From a sudden and unprovided death, save us, O Lord.
Update:
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/the-catholic-faith-of-kobe-bryant-77371
“The Catholic faith of Kobe Bryant”
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/the-catholic-faith-of-kobe-bryant-77371
Someone on Instagram said Kobe was at Mass this morning, Our Lady Queen of Angels Catholic Church. I pray so.
On that note, no matter how healthy you are or how old you are, pray constantly to the Blessed Virgin for the grace of a holy death.
gee nobody else died yesterday……….. right?
Yeah but only one of them was really good at stuffing an inflated piece of rubber through a steel hoop, which is really all that matters. That’s the kind of contribution to mankind multi-millionaires and adored celebrities are made of.
CD and JT…..teachable moment maybe? Most especially in this Protestant nation of ours. He praised his CATHOLIC faith as the reason for turning his life and marriage around! I’ve related his story to Protestants, Jews, Greek Orthodox and agnostic/atheists….how about you?
You’re missing the point. That his rape of a woman caused him to revert is a good thing (the reversion, not the rape). I wonder what the consequences for the woman were but nobody discusses that. Why not? And the fact that this is a protestant nation (at best) has nothing to do with it.
CD’s correct point is that there were eight other people on the helicopter who died. Other than Kobe’s daughter do you know the name of any one of them or their stories? Probably not. I hope they died in a state of grace. But they’re irrelevant because one of the souls on the helicopter was adored and unbelievably rich for doing absolutely nothing.
Kobe Bryant’s presence on the helicopter alone apparently makes it a “teaching moment.” If he weren’t on the helicopter, the story would have been a blip and already forgotten by you and all your non Catholic friends.
I hope his presence on the helicopter and the notoriety it brought to the crash brings people to convert to the faith. I also hope that the fact that his presence on the helicopter was the sole reason the crash got the attention it did will also bring people to another conversion. There’s another “teaching moment” for you to share with your friends.
Your virtue signaling is showing. No one said or implied Kobe’s life was worth more than the others who died. At the time I wrote this post, they didn’t know who else was on the chopper or even how many. You hate the man for being rich? Let’s all pray for him, his family, and the other families suffering through this.
I live pretty much every day with an awareness of my mortality. I have had a few very close calls in my life. Inches, moments separated me from eternity. I now take my moments very seriously and more, or less live every day, literally, as if it could be my last.
Our tombstone gets two dates and a dash. The dash is what’s important. Look at all those people under the gravestones. All of them, souls in eternity that lived a span for which they are now judged, punished or rewarded. That *dash* means everything. The second date approaches; may happen sooner than we think. Consider that, next time you visit a cemetery – the weight of the life behind each and every dash between the dates.
I imagine Kobe and his daughter (the others too, of course) in the final moments. I suspect everything was normal in the cabin until the impending crash was close upon them. They likely weren’t aware as the pilot made his series of mistakes. Then, toward the end, sudden, wide eyed awareness of their doom.
And that’s it. The “dash” is over and it is logged in the Lamb’s Book Of Life. The grieving note the birth and death dates carved in stone. The soul is forever aware of every moment of that “dash”.
One more thing. I have been forgiven much. As a former Protestant, one time secular Agnostic (didn’t care one way or another) who has sinned *much* in this life … I am very, very much in tune with Kobe’s story of sin, criminal sin and redemption. I love this about the Catholic Faith. I *LOVE* the Sacrament of Penance. God forgives, corrects, sanctifies. Kobe, in that regard of sin and (by God’s Grace) redemption, speaks for me.
Amen Aqua! I too relate to Kobe’s story of sin. His apparent repentance is something to celebrate and share. We don’t pray for him because he was rich, or handsome or talented on a basketball court….we pray for him because he and we are CATHOLIC!. And this being a predominately Protestant nation is ALL the more reason to publically make a big deal about our custom of praying for one of our own AFTER DEATH. The Prots don’t get this.