Yesterday I wrote about the lovely cherry blossom trees that are holy hints of spring. Today it occurs to me that Spring is a great time to talk about —— death and dying. What? Yep. Memento mori – “remember death.” There once was a time when a bleached white skull was placed in a visible spot in monasteries for all the monks to see. How morbid, some might say. One more god-awful custom that needs to go the way of the hair-shirt and the spiked-cords for self-flagellation. Maybe, but maybe not – at least not so fast. Perhaps a moment of serious consideration of that boney structure that resides within each and all of us has a place beyond the sophomore biology classroom and at least figuratively in our Lenten regimen.

[Elsewhere, I told how] A theology professor of mine once divulged that he had built himself the coffin he would one day be buried in. If my memory serves me correctly, I recall he kept it in a large walk-in closet where it served for the time being as a bureau for shirts and sweaters. His intention was neither to be morbid nor to encourage anxious preoccupation with death, but rather to keep himself awake to the reality of his life and to LIFE itself. For him, each morning was a reminder: I am going to die. Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return. Therefore, each new day posed him the question: how am I to LIVE, how am I to live TODAY (hodie!) that I might enjoy the embrace of grace forever? How am I to live today so that I consciously and gratefully EN-JOY this life? This is the day that God has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it!

My professor’s spiritual discipline, no less than the monk’s skull, was for the purpose of being acutely aware of the reality of death in order to be more fully awake to and appreciative of life. Especially in western culture today, death is viewed as the enemy, as the grim reaper, as the end of life rather than, for example, a vital part of it. But even more prevalent than portraying death as villain is the tendency not to consider death at all, to push it out beyond the periphery of our consciousness in the secret hope that out of sight might mean not only out of mind but out of the question. Ernest Becker’s book The Denial of Death is still as eloquent and challenging an explication of this tendency as it was in 1974 when he won the Pulitzer Prize for it. That death is a fact of life does not make it any easier. As far as this earthly life goes, it still is final, often difficult, demanding, untimely, sad, sometimes tragic or unjust.

But our faith does not subscribe to the all-encompassing notion that dying or death is the enemy. From the moment we come into this life we are on our way out of it. Most persons rarely face into this truth. But there are some who have no choice and others who are courageous for making the choice to face death lest they sleepwalk through their days only to be suddenly awakened by tragedy or trauma and discover they missed life. In his poem “Ask Me,” William Stafford writes, “Some time when the river is ice ask me / mistakes I have made. Ask me whether / what I have done is my life.” There is perhaps nothing more tragic than getting to the end of this burning wick and realizing we had taken the light for granted, that we had paid attention and given ourselves to the wrong things, and too late discovered that what we had done was neither our truest, most real life nor ultimately enlivening. French philosopher Leon Bloy says it this way: “The only real sadness in life is not to be a saint.” I believe a survey of the wisely wild and wildly wise men and women through the ages, those persons MOST FULL OF LIFE, were also those who were most aware of their own mortality, not theoretically but up close and personal. In their increased realization of the fragility of life, they grew in their appreciation for the gift of life.

The conscious facing of one’s mortality has its place in the Christian tradition, in ongoing formation and spiritual transformation, and in the spiritual practices of Lent. We do so not because Lent is about doom and gloom but to wake up to the present moment, to the surprise of living, and to God who is LIFE. The way we confront death is not by denying death but rather by living life ~ living more fully, more gratefully, more responsibly, and more compassionately.♦

~ The paradox: remembering death enables and encourages us to be re-membered to life.

pax
djm

NOTE: This entry is based on my article “Arise, O Sleeper.”

Artwork: Monk Contemplating a Skull, Thomas Couture