ANOTHER PERSONAL LOSS

MY BROTHER-IN-LAW PAUL MATTINGLY
May He Rest in Peace

Here he is at our family Christmas party last Saturday night. He was feeling fine. My last words to him and my siblings as I left to drive back to Louisville were, "Let's all love and appreciate each other. One of us may not be here next year!" We had no idea he would be next! I said the same thing at last year's family Christmas gathering. My youngest sister died several months later. We had no idea she would be first! 

May brother-in-law, Paul, died peacefully last night at 10:13 pm at University Hospital from a rare infection of his abdominal aorta. 

I anointed him earlier in the evening and things were looking better, but he took a turn for the worse as the evening progressed. He died surrounded by my sister, Brenda, and their five children whispering encouragement into his ears. Since he could not swallow, I laid my pyx with the Blessed Sacrament over his heart as he died. 

He was a man of prayer. He read his little prayer book daily, went to Mass every Sunday and Holy Day and prayed for his children. He was a good husband, father and neighbor. 

We are so grateful he did not have to suffer. This time he was only sick for a day and a half. He overcame massive burns over most of his body early in his marriage. I was there to help my sister change his bandages during Easter break from the seminary. He later survived bone cancer after a successful bone marrow transplant in Little Rock, Arkansas, and has been in remission for many years. 

He and my sister took me in and let me live in their basement when I was in the seminary and helped me find a summer job and a finally place to live down the street from where I now live. He has been a wonderfully supportive brother-in-law. He was a "good man." We will miss him. 

FUNERAL ARRANGEMENT ARE PENDING
He is a resident of Brandenburg, Kentucky