Text: Tar­ja Kor­ri

Trans­la­ti­on: Sirk­ka-Lii­sa Lei­no­nen

My me­mo­ries of­ten go back to the Christ­mas 30 ye­ars ago. We were ex­pec­ting our third child, who was due to be born in about a month. I had just had a pre­na­tal chec­kup, and eve­ryt­hing see­med fine. On St. Step­hen’s Day I be­gan to think so­met­hing might be wrong, and a doc­tor re­fer­red me to hos­pi­tal. Af­ter some exa­mi­na­ti­ons it tur­ned out our baby had died. I re­mai­ned in hos­pi­tal over­night, and my hus­band went home to see about our child­ren.

The night was long and lo­ne­ly. I hard­ly slept at all. Nur­ses chec­ked on me re­gu­lar­ly, but they did not have much to say. In­duc­ti­on of la­bor was star­ted in the mor­ning, and while wai­ting, I he­ard all kinds of sounds. New­born ba­bies cried. I al­so he­ard the mid­wi­fe tell a fat­her that the mot­her had sur­vi­ved sur­ge­ry but the baby had not. It was ea­sy to em­pat­hi­ze with the fat­her, alt­hough I had no prob­lem with my own he­alth and I had had time to pre­pa­re for the fact that there would be no baby to take home.

Our small, per­fect baby daugh­ter was born la­ter that mor­ning. De­ath had al­re­a­dy left some signs on her, but she loo­ked so fa­mi­li­ar, so like our ol­der child­ren. We were not al­lo­wed to hold the baby, who was ta­ken away for au­top­sy. As soon as I felt a lit­t­le re­co­ve­red, we went home. Dear friends came to vi­sit and con­so­le us, and cards of con­do­len­ces came in the mail.

When we la­ter went get the baby and pla­ced her in a cof­fin, the staff of­fe­red us a small de­vo­ti­on at the hos­pi­tal. We felt we did not need it. It see­med the staff would have li­ked to com­fort us, but they did not have the words. Even in the midst of sor­row, I felt sure that the baby was sa­fe­ly in he­a­ven. I even felt I should so­me­how com­fort the nur­ses.

The fu­ne­ral ser­vi­ce was at­ten­ded by the mi­nis­ter, my hus­band and I. My hus­band car­ried the cof­fin, and to­get­her with the mi­nis­ter they lo­we­red it in­to the grave where my hus­band’s mot­her had been bu­ried ne­ar­ly 16 ye­ars pre­vi­ous­ly.

It is pro­bab­ly not ea­sy for any mi­nis­ter to con­duct the fu­ne­ral of an un­bap­ti­zed baby. But I gu­ess it is ea­sier for a mi­nis­ter who be­lie­ves that ba­bies are child­ren of God even be­fo­re bap­tism. He can com­fort the grie­ving fa­mi­ly with the thought that the baby has al­re­a­dy re­ac­hed the he­a­ven­ly home. He can al­so speak about the hope for reu­ni­on.

Psalm 139 has these words: ”Yo­ur ey­es saw my un­for­med body; all the days or­dai­ned for me were writ­ten in yo­ur book be­fo­re one of them came to be.” The obi­tu­a­ry no­ti­ce for our baby had a short quo­te from a Fin­nish poem that re­minds us that Christ the Sa­vi­or ta­kes care of all child­ren, and that God’s grace en­ve­lo­ped the baby’s life even be­fo­re the first day daw­ned on her cot. The baby was a friend of an­gels. (Nii­lo Rau­ha­la: En­ke­lin tut­tu.) It was good to rely on that grace.

Be­cau­se my hus­band was unemp­lo­yed at that time, I re­tur­ned to work on­ly a week af­ter the de­li­ve­ry. We were buil­ding a new home, and life was very busy. On­ly a few months la­ter, I was preg­nant with a new baby.

Af­ter­wards I have thought that I did not ful­ly pro­cess the de­ath of the baby and did not al­low my­self to grie­ve. Qui­te un­ne­ces­sa­ri­ly, I did not let ot­her pe­op­le ap­p­ro­ach me and hard­ly dis­cus­sed the baby’s de­ath with any­bo­dy. I felt that pe­op­le who had not even seen the baby could not mourn for her.

Now that so many ye­ars have pas­sed and I have had time to think, I have be­gun to feel the loss more poig­nant­ly. A few ye­ars ago, I wrote a short story of my me­mo­ries for our ot­her child­ren to read. Last ye­ar be­fo­re Christ­mas I bought a me­mo­ri­al pain­ting: The pic­tu­re of a small an­gel was hung on the wall to­get­her with the con­fir­ma­ti­on and wed­ding pic­tu­res of our ot­her child­ren.

I re­mem­ber the be­au­ti­ful words spo­ken by an ol­der lady af­ter the loss of our baby. She said: ”You had an an­gel who went in­to he­a­ven.” That was where you went, our an­gel. Cal­led in­to light.