c. 1999 Religion News Service

(Dale Hanson Bourke is publisher of RNS.)

UNDATED _ Just an hour before we had been total strangers.

But the forced intimacy of side-by-side seats in a jumbo jet hurdling across the ocean at 40,000 feet relaxed our personal boundaries.

He made a joke about the safety film in his proper British accent. I laughed and before long we were exchanging full sentences. We talked about jobs and moved on to families. Another hour and wine-with-lunch later, we were talking about politics and religion. For total strangers growing up worlds apart, we shared many common values.

He talked of his career path and his dreams for the future. I shared my struggles to balance personal ambitions with family nurture. He punctuated his comments with references to God and I acknowledged my own faith and growing understanding that our lives had a larger purpose.

I still didn’t know his name, nor did he know mine. The odd etiquette of seasoned travelers often skips this step and moves right on to deeper discussions. We had nowhere to go for seven hours and had both seen the movie. We casually explored topics with the luxury of time to kill.

Somehow our conversation meandered in to Kosovo and Albania and then to Mother Teresa. My neighbor paused as he tried to frame his question.”I’ve always wondered …”he began,”what was so great about Mother Teresa ….”I mean, I know she did great work in the worst circumstances, but do you think she had more faith than any of the rest of us? Do you think she had a special gift?” We both pondered the question and I offered a halting thought or two. Then I asked,”Do you think it might be that she simply felt she was exactly where God wanted her and lived like she believed it?” My new-found friend’s face lit up.”Yes!”he exclaimed.”I think that really is it.” We went back to old ground then, the jobs we’d had and the ones we’d coveted. The balancing act between family and career.”What if we lived like that?”he asked.”What if we put everything we had into each day and each circumstance because we truly believed God had put us there for a reason?””No thoughts about our next career move,”I offered.”No impatience with our children,”he added.”No worries about whether we were getting ahead or behind,”I said.”No resentment about time that seems wasted,”he replied.

It was a small realization, perhaps, but something that realigned both of our lives.”What if we lived like we really believed God put us in each place for a reason?”he said again, mulling it over with a look of discovery.”It would change everything to live like that!”he said.

When the pilot announced we were minutes from landing, we looked at each other with surprise. The long flight had gone too quickly.”To think I almost changed seats when I saw all those empty rows in the back,”he laughed.

As we gathered up our suitcases and jackets it was hard to know how to say goodbye. Somewhere over the ocean we had each had a conversion of sorts. We walked off the airplane changed people, determined to live differently.

He shook my hand and said goodbye and then, as we ran off in different directions, he stopped and waved back to me. I still didn’t know his name and would never see him again. But it didn’t really matter.

Two strangers had shared a moment that had been orchestrated by God. Neither of us would ever doubt that.

DEA END BOURKE