Enduring Love, Everyday Grace

Love is one of the most talked-about actions in our culture, and it carries many different meanings. We use it to describe our favorite foods, summer beverages, vacation spots, or songs.

At Miravida, love includes all of those joys—but it also stretches into the harder, quieter acts that truly define it. Love sometimes looks like answering an extra call light, wiping down a table one more time, listening to a repeated story as though it’s brand new, or meeting confusion and complaints with patience and humility in the face of distress.

Within our walls, we practice a love that goes beyond preference—it’s rooted in care and service. It is staying with, serving, and walking alongside others because it is what needs to be done, what we are asked to do, and what we ought to do. Love calls us to duties we may not always choose, yet it inspires us to see the importance of what is done and how it is done. It endures through challenges and hard moments, and it often requires more of us than we think we have to give.

And while this love is lived out here every day, it is not meant to stay here. It is the kind of love our world needs—at home, in our neighborhoods, in our communities. When we choose love in these ways, we shape a culture of kindness and connection that reaches far beyond Miravida’s walls.

I see this love every day—between neighbors in the hallways, at bedsides, in laughter over a shared meal, and in the patience shown during difficult moments. To each of you who share this love, in big and small ways, thank you. You remind us that love is more than a feeling—it’s a way of living.

With love and grace,

Rev. Dr. Karin Derenne
Spiritual Services Director
Miravida Living