An a cappella ‘It Is Well With My Soul’ arrives just in time 

Like so many fellow Catholics, I'm struggling to come to terms with our Holy Father's recent passing. For the past few days, ever since we all woke up Easter Monday to the difficult, surprising news, I hadn't been able to give a name to, or put a finger on the hollow feeling in the center of my chest ... until I came across this remarkable a cappella rendition of the classic hymn 'It is Well with My Soul.'

The timeless lyrics that were written in a deep time of grief by the powerful, 19th-century Christian missionary Horatio Spafford spoke to me in a new way this week as I listened to them sung by the awesome a cappella group, King's Return.

This popular quartet has been a longtime Aleteia favorite, and they released the hymn just in time for Easter. The opening verse speaks of the author's heartache: 

When peace, like a river, attendeth my way,
When sorrows like sea billows roll;
Whatever my lot, Thou has taught me to say,
It is well, it is well, with my soul.

While Horatio Spafford's heartbreaking circumstances surrounding the writing of this hymn are well-known, they deserve to be repeated:

Horatio and his wife Anna suffered tremendously throughout their entire lives, so much that he was often compared to the biblical Job. Around the same time the Spaffords lost their first son, Horatio Jr., at the age of four to scarlet fever, much of their wealth and property was destroyed in the massive 1871 Chicago fire that devastated most of the city's downtown area.

Distraught as they were, the couple worked tirelessly to serve the poor and to share Christ's love with those less fortunate.

A few years later, Horatio sent his wife Anna and their four young daughters ahead of him by ship to England for a vacation. He had planned to travel with them but was delayed due to business obligations. 

Tragically, the ship carrying Anna and their daughters sank when it was hit by an iron sailing vessel. Two hundred and twenty-six people drowned, including all the Spaffords' living children. Anna miraculously survived. She was found unconscious and floating on a scrap of driftwood. As soon as she was able, she sent a telegram to her husband that read: "Saved, alone." 

Horatio immediately boarded a ship to meet his wife. A few days into his journey, the captain alerted him to the fact that they were passing over the exact spot where his children had perished. Horatio responded by returning to his cabin and writing 'It is Well with My Soul,' a hymn that speaks not only of a father's grief, but even more so, his deep trust in Divine Providence. 

It's no wonder these same lyrics have been such a comfort to me this week as the passing of our Holy Father has left me feeling like an orphan. 

Horatio Spafford wrote 'It is Well with My Soul' as a way to say goodbye to his daughters, and I'm listening to this beautiful hymn as a way of saying goodbye to my Holy Father.

The last verse isn't as well-known as the already mentioned first stanza, but I've found the lyrics to be almost medicinal during this time of grief:

For me, be it Christ, be it Christ hence to live:
If Jordan above me shall roll,
No pang shall be mine, for in death as in life
Thou wilt whisper Thy peace to my soul.

It is well, it is well, with my soul, with my soul

It is well, it is well with my soul ....