Love is of God (1 John 4:8). It is the most powerful force on earth. It comes in all shapes and forms, but it is ultimately mysterious as the following story demonstrates.

Colleen looked at the date on her calendar and sighed. A lifetime before — eighteen years ago, to be exact — she had given birth to a baby girl and given her up for adoption. Throughout the years, the thought of this child had haunted Coleen. Was she smart? Was she pretty? But above all, was she healthy?

It was getting close to her child’s eighteenth birthday, and Coleen was consumed with an unrelenting love for her daughter. Coleen lived in Canada, and according to the law she was finally free to conduct a search to discover her daughter’s whereabouts.

Coleen decided to make her move, and she called the newspaper in the town of Alberta, Canada, the baby’s birthplace. “Let me speak to your classified section,” she asked the operator at the Alberta Times. “I’d like to place an ad.”

“Sure,” said the operator, “what’s your message?”

She began, “happy birthday,” and provided the name she had given her daughter when she gave her up for adoption eighteen years before, along with a simple message announcing her search and her phone number in the remote town where she lived.

That very same day, a woman named, Jodi Mitchell, had called the Alberta Times. She too had placed an ad announcing her search for her mother who had given her up for adoption eighteen years ago. All she knew was that she was born in Alberta, Canada.

Immediately, the editor was overcome by a strange sense of purpose. He picked up the phone and called Colleen, excitedly. It was almost 11 P.M. Coleen was perturbed, hearing from the editor at such a late hour. What could this be, she thought? Did something go horribly wrong? Oh God, she prayed, come to my aid.

“Is there a problem?” Coleen asked, pulling herself together.

“No!” replied the editor, “it’s just that there’s a huge coincidence here that’s too big to ignore. There’s another ad in here that sounds, you know, a lot like yours.”

Colleen got goose bumps listening to the editor groping for words as he told her about the other ad. What’s the lady’s name? asked Coleen, nervously. “Jodi,” replied the editor, “the same name you gave in the ad.” Coleen let out a gasp. With a shaking hand, and tears welling up in her eyes, Coleen wrote the number down and called Jodi.

Jodi was Colleen’s daughter.

Who would have guessed that Coleen and Jodi would place identical ads, in the same distant paper, on the same day, in the same town?

Love, the say, is a many splendored thing. Only God, the master weaver, could have performed this miracle of bringing together, Coleen and Jodi, who were meant to be, from eternity, with one another.

Fr. Hugh Duffy