Because I am going to try a religious vocation, I have been meditating on death for about two weeks. This is not new to me, as I have had three brushes with physical death in my life owing to several operations and the fact that I had deadly reactions to the anaesthetics, which my doctors had not anticipated (nor I). I also discovered I had problems with my blood, which lacks properties which interferes with clotting or coagulation. To make very long stories short, with cancer and complications of breathing, I faced death physically three times.
My only sister died two weeks before her first birthday.
My son almost died at birth, he stopped breathing five times in the womb, and of pneumonia when he was seven . One faces death in many ways.
Now, facing physical death in one's self is not as difficult as one may think. When I had cancer, I had to face all types of possibilities, but I can honestly say that the entire time, after the initial shock, was like being on a retreat. God was very close to me during the entire process. Some other women with whom I have spoken have said the same thing. If we are open to God, He is there.
At this time, I am facing several different "deaths". All mothers experience death of a sort when their children finally leave the nest. I first faced that when my son went away to college. I cried all the way home in the car from the airport. Now that he is in the seminary, there is another type of death. But, he has always belonged to God , although he was loaned to me for a short time for God's glory.
Most parents state that the happiest times of their lives were the raising of their children. And, so do I. Having and raising a child is sheer joy.
Another type of death has to do with giving up the following. I have had to give up dreams of success in the world, not for monetary gain, but for my own satisfaction of a completion of years of study and research. High academic success would have been nice.
I have died to my own imagination. We can image all types of things we want to do or have, such as a peaceful,comfortable family life and, as in my case, as I have written hundreds of poem, dozens of plays, short stories and children's stories, artistic success. I have published only a smidgen of what I have produced over the years. This is a type of death, as each poem, each story is like a child of the imagination, waiting to go out into the world and stand up on his own. When this does not happen, the creative process is incomplete. That is a type of death.
When I give up what I want, either in the imagination, or in physical things, something happens. When I cooperate with the Cross, something happens. That happening is called freedom.
Almost two years ago, I downsized. Thankfully, before the downturn previous to that, I sold my house. I then, slowly but surely, divested myself of probably six thousand books, twenty plus years of teaching materials and notes, home schooling notes and aids, RCIA stuff, catechetical materials and material items, such as furniture and all the necessary items for a well-run, orderly, attractive, Midwest home until, finally, by March, 2011, I had passed on most of the things I had accumulated over many years of life. I sold my car.
God put people in my life who wanted and needed my things.
I do not miss any of it.
Dying by stages, I think, is easier than all at once. But, how can I tell? A friend of mine's husband, and also one of my uncles died walking the dog and on the way to meet friends on a Sunday afternoon.
These two men passed away, like a third friend of mine who died in his sleep, so quickly that their spouses had to take time to adjust. Some marriages end in death and some in separation, which can be a death.
Financial set-backs, which I and many Americans have experienced in these years, is another type of death. We think money and things give us freedom. It is just the opposite. Financial "downsizing" destroys pride and prejudice.
Some women cry at weddings as well as at funerals. A wedding is a joyous occasion, but it also a death-of independence, of other choices, of one's own will. We instinctively know that a choice closes other options. But, in that choice is freedom.
We are called to die daily in some ways. Perhaps it is in being patient; one of my worst faults is impatience. Impatience is pride and insecurity combined. Only God can help us die to ourselves in sins and imperfections. Only God can heal us. Patience brings healing and renewal.
If we look at the Passion and Death of Christ, we should notice something. His Resurrected Body holds the stigmata. Why? Because death changes us. Christ allowed Himself to die and He is in glory with the marks of His Wounds. We are never the same after deaths or Death. Even our crosses mark us.
As Christians, we are marked with the sign of the Cross. That is our badge of honour.
If we allow God to love us as He wants to do, we are free.
But, without the letting go, without the will to die to our own will, there is no chance for holiness.
And, only the holy see God.
One of my favourite passages of Scripture is this from Matthew 11:12:
And from the days of John the Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent bear it away.
It is the violence of the Cross, whether it be cancer or the empty nest, or failure or unrequited love, which creates the Kingdom of God within us. There is no other way.
To be continued.....