It was not my best weekend.

I had to go out East to attend my much beloved grandmother's funeral. She died suddenly, only two and a half months after my grandfather.

When I returned to school on Tuesday, I picked up The Observer and saw that Father Richard McCormick had died as well.

And somewhere in the middle, while reading for a theology class, I ran across the words "Blessed are they who mourn."

I didn't feel very blessed. I felt angry at God. When I left for my grandmother's funeral, I felt like someone had ripped my heart out of my chest and jumped on it for half an hour or so, and I just wanted not to HAVE a heart anymore so it would stop hurting. My grandmother was an amazing woman. I am her namesake, and she is my role model. She taught me how to be a woman, a Catholic, a feminist, a person. I feel an incredible emptiness and desolation when I think about this sudden hole in my life.

I'm sure that Richard McCormick's family and friends feel the same way. I feel that my life is poorer without him in it. I first met Father McCormick when I was assigned to write a news analysis on the cloning of Dolly the sheep. I was still a fairly green reporter, but I knew it wasn't going to be a run-of-the-mill interview when I asked McCormick if cloning was a good thing.

"God knows the world doesn't need six Dick McCormicks running around," he replied. Then he mused to himself more than me, "Although — maybe Newsweek could call them, then."

I interviewed him a few more times back when I covered most of the religion and ethics news for The Observer. He was always one of my toughest interviews, poking logical holes in my questions, anticipating my responses, generally running circles around me. I both dreaded these interviews — because I knew my head would be spinning — and eagerly anticipated them, because there was no one more interesting on campus to talk to. McCormick was unfailingly generous with his time, willing to give me long interviews on the smallest subjects, despite being a very busy man and a very sought-after interviewee.

Later on, I read some of his work in my theology classes, and he came to speak in some of those classes. I never had him for class, but I came to respect his academic prowess. And he never lost sight of his calling as a priest, a calling that was apparent in every statement he made.

It seems a terrible waste to have these two wonderful people die. Like Job, I want to demand answers from God. Somehow, I don't think the answers will be forthcoming.

But the Gospel says, "Blessed are they who mourn."

If the love we have for one another is a pale shadow of the love God has for us, maybe we should feel blessed that we loved these people enough to feel such powerful sorrow.

• Blessed are we