I met with one of our long-time supporters last Saturday. He was on our Board of Directors twenty years ago and helped us to raise money to buy and modernize our school building on Forest Avenue. He is what many people consider to be "a mover and a shaker". He is also one of the nicest and kindest men I have ever met.
Twenty years later, Phil is retired and in almost constant pain from a serious medical condition. But he is still serving as an honorary co-chairman (along with Bill Dunn, Sr.) of our current capital campaign. With Phil's help, we have received, at hardly any cost to us, three tracts of land on Troost, and we are now in the final stages (we hope) of acquiring the last property before we begin building a new addition to our high school campus.
Whenever Phil can, he meets or talks with me to guide me and to help us once again raise considerable financial help from other "movers and shakers". He has not lost his fundraising touch, or the respect and admiration of many in the philanthropic community.
Last Saturday, Phil shared with me one of the (many) poems he has written. I have heard him refer to his poetry over the years, and thought at first he was joking. He does not fit my image of a poet. But I have since learned that poets come in all sorts of fits, and can be characterized as someone so in love with life that they must use condensed language to describe that love. And Phil definitely loves life.
In fact, he told me that his life has been transformed by his own suffering, as well as through a chance visit he made some years ago to the ruins of one of the German concentration camps. He found it deeply unsettling and almost unfathomable. It put into perspective his own suffering, and led him deeper into the mystery of life and love.
Here is an excerpt from one of his poems:

"For when you can feel and respond
To the joys and sorrows of others
As if they were your own destiny
Then, in that sense of compassion
You may find the highest spiritual reality...."

My friendship with Phil has graced me with a deeper love and compassion for those who suffer, especially those I encounter in my work at DeLaSalle. Phil is one of those men who are movers and shakers of love as well as of the material world. We are fortunate to have his help and, yes, his love. Phil Kirk is living and sharing a "spiritual reality" that is transforming lives, and I am so thankful for him.