When I learned that Auxiliary Bishop David G. O’Connell had been shot to death in his home, I felt as if I had been turned to stone. I was standing in the house he had blessed, about to head out on a long-planned trip with my youngest daughter.

Years ago, when I told him I was pregnant with her, he had laughed. “A third, at your age? Sure, you’re still a Catholic at heart.”

Over the years, O’Connell had done his best to coax me back to the church. Though it never quite worked, he achieved something more miraculous: He restored my faith in faith.

I don’t know many people who have lived a life of loving service without that love at some point becoming bitter. Or without turning away from service and toward power. But I did know David O’Connell. Not well enough to begin to understand why someone would…