One of the best pieces of advice that I can give to preachers is to preach as if YOU were sitting in the front pew. That simple counsel is meant to prevent preaching from getting preachy. It reminds the homilist that he or she is not up there preaching at people but rather as one person among the community of faith. Not as one who has arrived, but rather as someone who also is on the way. It conveys “everything I’m offering to you, I need to hear myself.”

My previous post “Another Name for Grace—Gravy” was written first to myself and only then to you, my readers. Writing, talking, and reflecting about death as the borderline helps me remember that this earthly life comes to an end. Just that—without jumping too quickly to thoughts of an afterlife or beliefs about it—yea or nay. Life is fleeting. Such attention has helped me some to wake up and to savor without clinging. But honestly, my own certain death still seems equally real and unreal. I’m a work in progress.

It dawned on me the other day that Death is not out to kill us. That’s a funny thought, I thought. Death is just doing its job. I suspect like me most of you took it for granted that Death’s job description is to do God’s fetching—”You  Call. We Haul. That’s All.” That’s why with so many of us Death is about as popular at our front door as the debt collector or the bounty hunter or the young men in white shirts and thin black ties. But Death didn’t cause the car to skid on the black ice and down the embankment. Death didn’t order, aim, and fire Russia’s Land attack cruise missiles. Death didn’t murder the young Iranian woman Mahsa Amini for allegedly wearing her hijab improperly. Nor did God by the way.

The faith I hold or that gently holds me says that when it comes to the deceased, Death’s job is to accompany and transport them or us from life to LIFE. Death as the ferryman in the Final Crossing. Death as kind, thoughtful escort, not killjoy.

And for the living, I now suspect Death’s primary purpose—and the thing that satisfies Death the most—is when its presence wakes us up to life and living. Wakes us up to the wonder and mystery and gratuitousness of it all. Wakes us up to what matters most, to the gift of one another, to the sacrament of little things: the easy company of a friend, kissing our kids or grandkids goodnight, a morning cup of coffee on the back porch as the birds get ready for their day, reading a good book, sun on our back, rain on our face, snow on our tongue, a good cry or a better laugh that act like an enema for the soul, a song that takes us back to carefree days of youth, a sense of Divine presence while on a walk in the woods, having a body and senses to experience wonder and awe, sadness and compassion, grief and praise, and gratefulness for loved ones that is so big we think we’re going to burst. This is why it is worth keeping death always before our eyes (St. Benedict) because it can rouse us to life and living, break us open to this day, hour, moment—to now, here, this.

This week I sat with twenty-one directees in spiritual guidance. After nearly thirty-five years of receiving people’s stories, I am not surprised how often a week can take on a certain unsolicited theme. This week it was dying and death and grief and grieving—up close and personal, not hypothetical or in theory. At least half my directees touched on these experiences one way or another. Unsurprisingly, it resonated with my own life this past month or two: a dear friend sat with his father and family as his dad died. One of my sisters spent hours and hours with her best friend who died a slow death. I learned from a grade school friend that one of our classmates died a couple of weeks ago from cancer. I saw his obituary photo and he looked not much different than he did in the eighth grade (No one will be saying that about me). My cousin shockingly lost her son too soon. My sister’s husband Mike recently died surrounded by her and their three grown children. I only pray I face my death as humbly and bravely as Mike did his. Such a good, decent, kindhearted, salt-of-the-earth man. It was a very moving and beautiful scene to watch how they cared for him and were present to him in his last days, hours, minutes, breath.

And all around us, in our neighborhoods, country, and world so much unnecessary, unjust, violent death perpetrated on humans and on the earth itself by humans. Mea culpa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. 

Only a few days before my brother-in-law died his son found a playlist that Mike had made marked: EOL (End of Life). I keep fiddling with my list. One of Mike’s favorite songs was “Spirit” by one of our favorite bands—the Irish group The Waterboys. Maybe it will bring you solace and lift your spirit as it does ours. So this is for Frank Sr. and Susie and Ezzy and Jack and Mike and all those loved ones named this week by my directees and all those you keep close in heart and mind, and yes, all those who have lost loved ones unnecessarily, tragically, some at the hands of humans because they failed to keep faith with who the Author of Life had created them to be.

ARTWORK: All by Bridgette Guerzon Mills (Top) “Not Alone” (Middle) “Golden Hill” (Bottom) “Emergence”. One of my favorite artists is the multi-talented Bridgette Guerzon Mills. I love what she creates. She has been exceedingly gracious and generous to me regarding the use of her artwork. Please check out the breadth of her work HERE.

PHOTO: Mike Bonn (1951 – 2022) R.I.P.

Spirit Lyrics

Man gets tired
Spirit don’t
Man surrenders
Spirit won’t
Man crawls
Spirit flies
Spirit lives
When man dies

Man seems
Spirit is
Man dreams
The spirit lives
Man is tethered
Spirit free
What spirit
Is man can be

What spirit
Is man can be

What spirit
Is man can be

What spirit
Is the man can be

Now we tread the fresh fields
The higher grounds and the summer slopes
That man may someday climb on
Now we tread the fresh fields
The higher ground and the summer slopes
That man may someday climb on

We’re on the heels of Rimbaud
We are in the swing
Chandelier-like dancing
And we feel everything
High on the wine of life
High on the wine of life
High on the wine of life
Untethered and free
Untethered and free
Untethered and free
Untethered and free
What spirit is man can be
Ooh man can be
Ooh man can be
man can be

Songwriters: Michael Scott
Spirit lyrics © BMG Rights Management

This week’s mantra:
Untethered and free. Untethered and free.

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