When news came to the wali of the car accident in which his 6 kids had died he said ‘al-hamdulillah’.

His colleague’s conviction was rock-hard – when he met and said ‘salaam alaykum, how are you? and how are the kids?’ that he still had them – despite endless attempts in vain to quietly remind him of the treacherous, snowy night, and that he had taken a second wife in the hope of more. He had now given up and merely said ‘al ahamdulillah’ as that was what the other expected of him. But it was not resignation, rather recognition. He then  added ‘Remember Allah if you forget’.

grazie mille a Montalbano, Sapia, p. 221