Victims of wildfire praise ‘amazing Catholic support group’

[Michie]

Altadena, California, residents return to houses and find nothing but ashes. But they are "trying to concentrate on gratitude."

Sarah Ray will always remember the scratches on the bedroom wall. She would gaze at them each night before going to bed, thinking of her husband, who died just two years ago. It was the hospice bed that left the marks.

“My husband always got mad at me because I would always mess up the little remote thing, and it would scratch the wall,” Ray said of her husband, Casey. “We would laugh about it. He died of a brain tumor. He could no longer talk, but he still had his joy. So he taught me about suffering and having joy together.”

Now the scratches are etched into Sarah Ray’s memory, but that is all that is left of them. Her house is gone – consumed by the Eaton fire that ripped through Altadena, California, northeast of Los Angeles, this past week.

Also gone is the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe that hung in the Rays’ bedroom.

Continued below.

LA wildfire tests faith of Catholic school parents

Altadena, California, residents return to houses and find nothing but ashes. But they are "trying to concentrate on gratitude."

aleteia.org