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The Kennedy family is grieving the loss of Maeve Kennedy Townsend McKean and her son Gideon. While the coronavirus pandemic has prevented the American political family from physically being together during this tragic time, they are pulling together to remember their late relatives via “daily Zoom calls,” a friend of the family told People magazine. There are also plans to have a memorial service “at some point in the future.” The insider added, “This is such a horrible time to lose somebody. Everyone’s trying to be careful.”
Over the weekend, family members participated in a Zoom prayer service led by Timothy Shriver. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. shared screenshots of the Kennedy, Shriver, Lawford, McKelvey, Allen, Schlossberg, Schwarzenegger and Cuomo cousins holding up their hands in the shape of hearts during the service. Maria Shriver and Katherine Schwarzenegger appear to be among the relatives who participated in the video conference.
Maeve was the granddaughter of Robert F. Kennedy, brother of former President John F. Kennedy . The 40-year-old and her eight-year-old son have been presumed dead after they went missing following a canoe accident last Thursday. The mother-son duo boarded the canoe on Chesapeake Bay to retrieve a ball that got kicked into the water. On April 2, the vessel was found capsized miles away by the Coast Guard. One day later on April 3, Maeve’s husband David McKean wrote on social media, “It has been more than 24 hours, and the chances they have survived are impossibly small. It is clear that Maeve and Gideon have passed away. The search for their recovery will continue, and I hope that that will be successful.”
The family was self-quarantining at a house owned by Maeve’s mother, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend. David revealed that they decided to go to the property because they were “hoping to give our kids more space than we have at home in DC to run around.” Aside from Gideon, Maeve shared seven-year-old daughter Gabriella and two-year-old son Toby with her husband. In his emotional post, David penned, “As Gabriella and Toby lay sleeping next to me last night, I promised them that I would do my best to be the parent that Maeve was, and to be the person that Gideon clearly would have grown up to be. Part of that is keeping their memories alive.”