Last week anticipating giving a talk on Mev at her alma mater Visitation Academy, I inquired on Facebook if anyone from her Viz days had recollections about her. Stephanie Ortbals-Tibbs offered the following…
I still keep a card she gave me, framed and on my desk. It’s in Spanish and she translated it on the back for me. Her handwritten note reads, “Today you should know how to run risks. Tomorrow you’ll see more clearly.” That was her–a risk taker and a person with a seemingly boundless store of love and enthusiasm. Mev was such a courageous person. She went to places and had encounters that would have scared, disgusted, and/or discouraged others, had a single-minded focus on social justice, and met the insanely cruel diagnosis of her brain tumor with more faith and grace than anyone else could have mustered. I think of her often and can’t believe she’s been gone decades by now. I sometimes pray to her, and I truly believe she is a saint–regardless of whether she’s ever officially recognized as one.
