CCAirwaves
Welcome to CCAirwaves! CCAirwaves is the official podcast of the Catholic Cemeteries Association. Our hosts, Paige Muttillo and Joel Hansel, will provide informational and inspirational segments that will help you work through your grief in a healthy way, learn more about our Catholic faith, and much more. CCAirwaves is available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, and other streaming platforms. If you have a topic you'd like us to discuss, please email us at podcast@clecem.org. We look forward to forging relationships with our Catholic community!
CCAirwaves
Messages from Heaven- Signs in Nature
In this episode, we share three powerful stories about receiving signs from departed loved ones through unexpected natural phenomena. Each account reveals how ordinary elements of nature – an impossibly blooming lilac bush, a perfectly heart-shaped rock, and a visiting firefly – provided extraordinary comfort to people navigating grief.
If you've received a message from heaven and would like to share it with us, you can email us at podcast@clece.org, or send us a message on our social media, which is at CC Airwaves. You can also use the text message option in the description to share your thoughts.
Do you have a topic you'd like us to discuss? Please email us at podcast@clecem.org!
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Podcast: "CCAirwaves" on your favorite streaming platform!
Thank you so much for joining us. Hello everyone and welcome back to CC Airwaves. My name is Paige, Mattillo and Joel. How are you?
Speaker 2:I'm fine, paige, how are you?
Speaker 1:I'm doing really well. I'm very excited because it seems like we're finally getting some nice weather. Winter is turning into spring and the sun is finally coming out, so I could not be happier.
Speaker 2:Oh for sure you can definitely feel a definite change in the weather pattern. I think, um, I think there are a lot of people out there that are like me that you know things are moving better than they did back in January and February, when it was really really cold and everything was stiff. All your joints weren't working.
Speaker 1:And Joel, I know you hate complainers. I know you do, but daylight savings really did a number on me and I'm finally recovering.
Speaker 2:I really don't understand. I know I'm sorry, big deal, but I don't know it. Just it really messes me up every single year and I know it's coming and I'm usually fine during that day and you know, what I don't quite understand is you're not even in the generation where you actually had to physically walk around the house and change all the clocks. Everything changes automatically for you.
Speaker 1:No, there are some things in my house like the oven and the microwave, but that's it, my car radio. So, yeah, no, I shouldn't be complaining, because it you know, there are worse things in life. Anyway, let's get started. Today we will be sharing messages from heaven, specifically focusing on signs in nature. So I'm going to start us off with the first story, which was submitted by Leah M.
Speaker 1:The morning of my niece's funeral, I woke up with an unfamiliar heaviness in my chest. It was a cold October day, but the air felt sharper than usual. I stepped outside to gather my thoughts before the funeral. The trees had already lost all their leaves due to the season. Everything was lifeless around me. My niece was too full of life to leave the world so soon. She was a sweet girl, had a way of seeing the beauty in everything. She loved the lilac bush in my backyard, the one she would sit beside for hours in the spring. She called it her happy place. But it wasn't spring, it was October and nothing was supposed to be blooming.
Speaker 1:I forced myself to prepare for the day ahead, ensuring I had tissues in my coat pocket. But as I took a final deep breath before heading to church, something caught my eye through the kitchen window. A splash of color. It didn't make sense.
Speaker 1:I stepped outside, leaves crunching beneath my shoes and walked towards the backyard. My breath caught in my throat. The lilac bush was in full bloom. Not just a few stubborn blossoms, but an explosion of purple flowers. The sight was impossible, out of place in the middle of October, but there it was, flourishing, alive, just as she had loved it. I felt my knees weaken as warmth spread through my chest, and that moment I knew she was at peace. She was telling me in the quietest, most beautiful way that she was still here, that she would always be here. Tears welled in my eyes, but for the first time in days, they weren't just from sorrow, they were from something deeper comfort, understanding, maybe even hope. At the funeral I spoke about the lilacs how they weren't supposed to be in bloom, how they shouldn't have survived the cold and yet they had. Just like love does, just like she does.
Speaker 2:You don't normally see purple flowers in the fall.
Speaker 1:No, you don't. I'm used to seeing leaves and trees Oranges reds, some green, a lot of brown.
Speaker 2:Right, you might see some things get tricked out by the weather. Right, you get that frost, you get that first freeze. You know, things might then get, like I say, get tricked out by the weather.
Speaker 1:But rarely any purple.
Speaker 2:But unless it's in a mum, that's probably about the only place where I would see, where you would even begin to see. Purple Might be a mum, but definitely not a lilac bush. That is absolutely something to behold. I think I myself would have been just taken aback by something like that. It's almost like the burning bush in the Bible, right?
Speaker 1:And you know our bereavement coordinator, rhonda, she often speaks about spring and she'll say that it's the time when hope comes again, because it's kind of the time when things start to grow and there's this renewal in the weather, all of these things. And when you start to see those flowers pop up, you get that hope for spring. And I know that when I was recently at my house and I started to see the flowers, I kind of felt that inside me and you rarely feel that in the fall. And the fact house and I started to see the flowers, I kind of felt that inside me and you rarely feel that in the fall. And the fact that she was able to see these flowers and it was a sign from her niece, I can only imagine the feeling she had inside her.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Our second story was submitted by Kelly B. The ocean had always been a special place for my brother and me. As kids, we would spend hours at the beach searching for the perfect rocks Not seashells or driftwood, just rocks smooth ones, speckled ones, tiny ones that fit between our fingers, big ones we had to dig out together. We'd run up to each other, probably showing off our latest discoveries like they were buried treasure. We would create stories about the rocks, imagining where they came from and who had discovered them before. Celebrities, mermaids, pirates and more all became part of these stories. I never really thought about it much back then, I just liked being by his side.
Speaker 2:I visited the beach again, this time without him. It had been a year since he left this world and I still wasn't sure how to move through it without him. I bent down and picked up a rock, turning it over in my palm. It wasn't right, too rough, too ordinary. I dropped it and kept walking.
Speaker 2:The waves crashed against the shore, pulling the tide further out, revealing more of the sand beneath my feet. I knelt down, running my fingers through the damp grains, just as I had so many times before, and then I saw it A rock nestled perfectly in the sand, shaped like a heart. I froze my breath catching in my throat. It was smooth, rounded at the edges, as if the waves had spent years perfecting its shape. It was impossible, and yet there it was, waiting for me. It was him. It had to be. I could almost hear his voice teasing me for getting emotional over a rock, but I knew. Just like every stone had a story, this one did too, and it was ours. The wind carried my tears away as I closed my fingers around the heart-shaped rock, holding it tight. The grief was still there, still raw, but for the first time in a long time, so was something else.
Speaker 1:Here I am getting emotional over a rock as well. That's a beautiful story, and I mean we always say it. You always find hope in the most unexpected places, and sometimes that place can be in the sand. And she's right. That rock does represent them in their relationship as brother and sister and everlasting love that comes from that. Our third story was submitted by Max H.
Speaker 1:The reception hall was filled with laughter, clinking glasses and the soft glow of candlelight. It was a beautiful wedding, one that my wife would have loved. She always had an eye for elegant details, from the floral centerpieces to twinkling string lights hanging above the dance floor. I tried to focus on the joy of the evening, on the love surrounding me, but every moment only made her absence more noticeable. This was my first wedding without her, the first of so many things I would have to face alone. I had made it through the ceremony, through the toast and the dinner. I even smiled at the slideshow of the bride and groom's journey together, but when the first dance began, I felt something inside me unravel. I couldn't do it. I excused myself as quietly as I could, weaving through the crowd with a forced smile until I reached the exit.
Speaker 1:The night air was crisp, a welcome contrast to the warmth of the reception hall. I took a deep breath, trying to steady myself, to push down the weight that had been growing in my chest all evening. Then I felt it Something light and delicate landed on my ring finger. I looked down and saw a firefly, its tiny body glowing softly in the darkness. I froze. My wife loved fireflies. She always said they were little messengers, tiny flickers of light reminding us that we're not alone. I could still hear her voice laughing as she reached out to catch one during a summer night in our backyard. I stared at the small insect, its golden glow pulsing like a heartbeat, and in that moment I felt it Her presence, her warmth, her love. Tears burned in my eyes as I exhaled, my finger trembling slightly as the firefly lingered for a moment longer before taking off, disappearing into the night. I could have left, I could have driven home and let the night slip away in silence, but instead I turned back towards the reception hall. I wasn't alone not really.
Speaker 1:I walked inside feeling something I hadn't felt in a long time a quiet comfort, a gentle nudge reminding me that love never truly leaves us. And so for her, I stayed.
Speaker 2:I like that story Just like the other two, all of these stories. To the ordinary person, these signs wouldn't have been signs but to those specific people, those incidences, those, those moments the firefly, the rock, the bush. No meaning to any other person, but to those specific people that needed some comfort. Found comfort in those signs, for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think the thing about this story is, even though one of the signs that he may have taken from it is that she's still there, they still have their everlasting love, I'm kind of seeing the message in a different way, and it's that she doesn't want him to be alone. She wants him to be surrounded by the love of the people that he knows at the wedding. And I think a lot of times when people are experiencing grief, they tend to isolate themselves or they tend to dwell on the past rather than look forward at those moments that are coming up, and so maybe this was his reminder to keep living life and, to, you know, do it for her. Well, that's all our stories today.
Speaker 1:If you've received a message from heaven and would like to share it with us, you can email us at podcast at CLECE-E-C-E-M dot org, or send us a message on our social media, which is at CC Airwaves. We also have a new feature on Buzzsprout. I've mentioned it a few times now, but I'll mention it one last time. You can now use the text message option in the description to share your thoughts about the episode or any other feedback directly with us. Thank you so much for listening and have a great day.