Death is the great equalizer. All our power and wants, all our hopes and desires eventually die with us—buried in the grave. Oblivious, we journey selfishly toward the big sleep, placing importance on things that have no importance, only to be reminded at the most inopportune times how frail our lives truly are.

As creatures of emotions, we pray to a God whose existence we have no proof of, our unbridled faith designed merely to quell our primordial fear of death as we try to convince our intellects that an afterlife must surely exist. God is merciful, God is just, we tell ourselves, and then the unthinkable happens: a child drowns in a swimming pool, a drunk driver kills a loved one, a disease strikes a betrothed.

When goes our faith then? Who can pray to a God that steals an angel? What divine plan could possibly justify such a heinous act? Was it a merciful God that chose to strike my Maria in the prime of her life? Was it a just God who determined that she wallow in pain, suffering in agony until He finally got around to the heavenly task of taking mercy on her tortured soul?

And what of her husband? What sort of man was I to stand idly by and allow my beloved to suffer so?

With heavy heart, I allowed each day to slip by as the cancer dragged Maria closer to the grave. And then one night as I sat sobbing by her bedside, she looked at me through sunken eyes, a wretched creature more dead than alive, and begged me for mercy.

What could I do? God had abandoned her, refusing her respite from the incessant torture. Bending down, my body trembling, I kissed her one last time, praying to a God whose existence I now both questioned and cursed to give me strength. Pressing the pillow to her face, I extinguished her last dying breath, knowing full well that I was extinguishing the very flame of my soul.

The deed complete, I turned, shocked to find my son, an unknowing accomplice, staring at me through the dark angelic eyes of his mother.

What heinous act had I committed? What brave words could I possibly muster to regain this child’s lost innocence? Stripped of all pretense, I stood there naked, a weak, beguiled father who had unwittingly condemned his own son’s psyche through an act which, only minutes before, I had believed to be both humane and unselfish.

Helpless, I watched my son bolt from our home and run into the night to vent his rage.

Had I a weapon, I would have blown my head off right then and there. Instead, I fell to my knees and sobbed, cursing God, screaming his name in vain.