Well, that’s it. Your life is over. The abrupt passing of a dear friend in a sudden moment is not only something I had not prepared for. I actually looked forward to seeing her in about 36 hours when we would meet up at Sunday Mass. But that wasn’t to be, and the sharp end was not negotiable.
There has been an outpouring of dismay, grief and sorrow at the passing of Caroline Jones. She was so poised and self-possessed that moving into her presence was an immediately arresting experience. Her calm presence invited anyone she met and engaged with into a stillness she seemed so familiar with.
And, of course, Caroline’s passing is a forceful reminder to all of us struck by her passing of the shortness of our own lives and the certainty that we will come to an end too.
My first direct encounter with Caroline was some forty years ago when she was adding Catholicism to the resources for her own inner journey. In that moment, she was accompanied by our mutual dear friend Fr Paul Coleman who was then parish priest here in North Sydney. And he remained her companion till his passing which we celebrated here at St Mary’s in 2017.
But our intersecting lines went back much further through my father whose friend and fellow ex-student of Riverview was Dr Callie King. His son Justin was a Jesuit and inherited from his father that capacity to slow life and interactions down to a snail’s crawl as he quietly listened and responded only when necessary.
'Listening was Caroline’s leading edge. Her piercing eyes laid hold of you as her questions and observations invited you deeper and deeper into whatever you brought to the encounter. Somehow she was asking you to shed whatever presented as the key issue uppermost in your consciousness and lay bare where the impulse to share and interact rested.'
As much as I could understand of it, Caroline and Justin grew up as brother and sister and, if they did, that characteristic of the King family so evident in Justin and Callie was to be found in Caroline in abundance — personally and professionally.
Listening was Caroline’s leading edge. Her piercing eyes laid hold of you as her questions and observations invited you deeper and deeper into whatever you brought to the encounter. Somehow she was asking you to shed whatever presented as the key issue