Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, of course, I’m still reeling a little after Bishop Tom’s funeral on Saturday, which was just marvelous. You can find the text of Brother Geoffrey’s sermon here. One of the things that I have long loved about being an Anglican is that our worship is actually intended to accomplish something—at Holy Week I always talk about how we do the last week of Jesus’ life, with foot washing and prayers at the cross and celebration of the resurrection. It’s not an abstraction. The funeral on Saturday, too, did what it was supposed to do.
We laughed at stories like Tom telling a visitor to the monastery who asked about it that he was the only one wearing a cross because he was “monk of the month.” We cried when we sang “King of Glory, King of Peace,” Tom’s favorite hymn. We cried when the silence seemed to stretch forever when Brother James, who was to begin the Prayers of the People, just couldn’t speak.
We shared in the Eucharist that is the Body and Blood of Christ who unites us and in whom we find our peace, in whom, the dead are not dead and we all rise to life again. We cried—again—when the brothers sang the Song of Simeon—“ Lord, you now have set your servant free to go in peace as you have promised/ For these eyes of mine have seen the Savior, whom you have prepared for all the world to see.”
And so he is set free, and so are we.
There’s a really important tension to hold when we stand in the middle of life and death. We can say that Tom is set free, along with all of those names we printed in the bulletin on Sunday for All Saints Day, and believe that he is free and sees the glory of God face to face. We hold that reality in one hand. We treasure that promise that Jesus Christ has gone before us and by the grace and miracle of God defeated the power of death. In our other hand, we hold the reality that life is a wonderful, astonishing, and precious gift. In its messiness and mud as well as in its joy and laughter, life is a gift. To welcome death as also a gift is not to diminish the importance of our course on earth—holy as the dying was, the living was holy, too.
Brother Geoffrey quoted the second century bishop Irenaeus of Lyon—“the glory of God is the human person fully alive.” Fully alive includes grief as well as joy. For now, I’m trying to take my time for both.
Blessings,
Sara+
Showing posts with label Resurrection. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Resurrection. Show all posts
Friday, November 7, 2014
Monday, June 10, 2013
Preparing for Gentle Death
Dear People of Christ Church
As you may have
heard on Sunday, this week we'll gather at 7pm to hear from our own Rob
Atwood and Christine August on end of life care. Rob is a hospice social worker
and Christine is an ICU nurse-both come to us with a great wealth of knowledge
of how we die. It happens to everyone, and even God in Jesus Christ went
there with us, but it's still a topic we fear. The fact is, though,
talking with the people we love about what we want near the end of our own
lives, or what they want at the end of theirs, is one of the greatest gifts we
can give. But it's hard. We don't want to be ghoulish, or make anyone
uncomfortable, or we can't countenance the idea of not having those we love
with us every day. We'd just rather talk about it...another day.
In a Christian context,
though, we're given a new freedom, a different context to consider the death of
our bodies. We can stand neither "for" nor "against" death,
but beside, as a known part of our human existence that will happen to us all.
Francis of Assisi put it this way in the hymn we know as "All
Creatures of our God and King:"
And thou most kind and gentle
Death,
Waiting to hush our latest breath,
O praise Him! Alleluia!
Thou leadest home the child of
God,
And Christ our Lord the way hath
trod.
O praise Him! O praise Him!
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!
Kind and gentle death, leading us
home to God. Wow.
Life is a tremendous gift, and we
are stewards-caretakers-of these bodies and souls that are given us. They are a
blessing. Our life is a blessing. Modern medicine and technology are a
blessing. There are many of you whose lives I treasure who have survived
illnesses that just twenty years ago would have been a death sentence.
As much as we are grateful for all the many treatments that are now
possible to prevent death, we also know that there's more to the story than
just our bodies' eventual end.
We have a responsibility to
preserve life, but we can also be realistic about what treatments are likely to
be effective and which are not. If nothing can separate us from God and
the love of those we love, then we don't have to approach death as the
enemy. Choices about care can be made from the standpoint of compassion
for the whole person, not just the scientific alleviation of a particular
symptom or illness. If someone near death is unable to swallow or loses
interest in food, for example, is it compassionate to give a feeding tube? It's
a hard question. It may prolong the life of their body, but that may come
at another cost.
In our Church's teaching about the
end of life, we differentiate between "passive" and
"active" ways in which death may be hastened. The passive withholding
of treatment is an ethical choice; if there is no prognosis for recovery, the
question becomes whether the patient's dying process is being prolonged, as
opposed to whether their actual life is being extended. At the same time,
when the physician assisted suicide referendum came around at election time, I
voted "no;" to take an action specifically with the desired outcome
being death is not, in my view, an ethical choice. As Episcopalians, also, we
respect each others' freedom of conscience. These issues are complicated, and
we don't condemn those who believe otherwise. There are times when the
lines are blurry and that's why it's so important that we talk to those we love
about the choices they want us to make. Fill out the legal paperwork for
who will be your health care proxy if you can't make decisions for
yourself. Put down, in writing if necessary, the kind of treatment
you do and do not want and tell that person.
As part of our conversation next
week, I'll also make available a booklet we put together several years ago
called "A Christian Prepares for Death," which leads you through many
of the choices to be made in preparing for the kind of burial you want. We
might think, "I won't exactly be present, so I'll let the people who
survive me make the choices." But let me tell you from the experience of
going through this with a lot of people-the most comforting thing for the
surviving person is to know what you would have wanted! This goes for
whether you want to be cremated or have "Go Tell it on the Mountain"
sung as much as for whether you would want to be removed from a ventilator.
Small decisions loom awfully large in a time of grief. Communication
about death is not morbid--it's one of the most loving things you can do.
I'll leave you with this piece of
Scripture:
For I am convinced that neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to
come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation,
will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our
Lord. (Romans 8:38-39)
Thanks be to God!
Blessings,
Sara+
Sara+
Tuesday, June 19, 2012
From May 31: On grieving...a wordless space
Dear people of Christ Church,
This morning, I'm back at work after having spent the last week with my family in Sweden. I cried when I read the piece I wrote in this space last week; what I didn't know, writing that on Tuesday night, was that, contrary to my comment about her living "six days or six weeks," it turned out to be more like six hours. Meanwhile, I was stranded in Toronto after my flight was cancelled so I got the news of her death in an anonymous hotel room near the airport. It was, as they say, a "good death," with her daughter and sister each holding a hand, but given that I would have made it if my flight had not been cancelled, there was, along with my own grief, a level of very mundane fury at Air Canada for not having its planes in order.
The writer Elaine Scarry, I think, said somewhere that pain takes away our words. In some ways, grief does this, too, because there's such a wide net of loss when someone dies. When we grieve, we don't just grieve the person who has died, but the whole constellation of realities and associations that that person held for us. In our meeting with the pastor who would do the service for Barbro, we all talked about how she had always been "in charge," that she was the big sister, the mother, the one who could do anything. From a leaking washing machine hose to a piece of broken jewelry, she was a fixer. "So who takes that role now?" Pastor Olaf asked. As if anyone could!
It's easy to trust in God's providence for her. I can paint beautiful and sentimental pictures of the wholeness and grace that envelops her in death, the clarity of a sunset on the Angerman river in Northern Sweden where we always went on vacation. Trusting God's providence for *myself* is quite a bit more difficult, and I find myself back in the wordless space (or, when there are words, the ones that come to mind are not printable here!). So there is a certain silence at the center of the experience, but being home, the work of living marches on.
That was the other strange, but wonderful, thing about my trip; in addition to bursts of tears, there was also some very pleasant tourism, beautiful weather, and yummy Swedish food (yes, it actually IS a lot like the cafeteria at Ikea). My cousin and my mother and I did not only sit around crying: there was the startling blue of the Baltic Sea, the spinning of wind turbines (eat your heart out, Cape Wind), and the brilliant yellow of rapeseed fields. I can't imagine it, but I think the kingdom of God must be in color, too.
So thanks for reading--what a wonder to come home to such an inviting space for reflection and prayer.
Blessings,
Sara+
This morning, I'm back at work after having spent the last week with my family in Sweden. I cried when I read the piece I wrote in this space last week; what I didn't know, writing that on Tuesday night, was that, contrary to my comment about her living "six days or six weeks," it turned out to be more like six hours. Meanwhile, I was stranded in Toronto after my flight was cancelled so I got the news of her death in an anonymous hotel room near the airport. It was, as they say, a "good death," with her daughter and sister each holding a hand, but given that I would have made it if my flight had not been cancelled, there was, along with my own grief, a level of very mundane fury at Air Canada for not having its planes in order.
The writer Elaine Scarry, I think, said somewhere that pain takes away our words. In some ways, grief does this, too, because there's such a wide net of loss when someone dies. When we grieve, we don't just grieve the person who has died, but the whole constellation of realities and associations that that person held for us. In our meeting with the pastor who would do the service for Barbro, we all talked about how she had always been "in charge," that she was the big sister, the mother, the one who could do anything. From a leaking washing machine hose to a piece of broken jewelry, she was a fixer. "So who takes that role now?" Pastor Olaf asked. As if anyone could!
It's easy to trust in God's providence for her. I can paint beautiful and sentimental pictures of the wholeness and grace that envelops her in death, the clarity of a sunset on the Angerman river in Northern Sweden where we always went on vacation. Trusting God's providence for *myself* is quite a bit more difficult, and I find myself back in the wordless space (or, when there are words, the ones that come to mind are not printable here!). So there is a certain silence at the center of the experience, but being home, the work of living marches on.
That was the other strange, but wonderful, thing about my trip; in addition to bursts of tears, there was also some very pleasant tourism, beautiful weather, and yummy Swedish food (yes, it actually IS a lot like the cafeteria at Ikea). My cousin and my mother and I did not only sit around crying: there was the startling blue of the Baltic Sea, the spinning of wind turbines (eat your heart out, Cape Wind), and the brilliant yellow of rapeseed fields. I can't imagine it, but I think the kingdom of God must be in color, too.
So thanks for reading--what a wonder to come home to such an inviting space for reflection and prayer.
Blessings,
Sara+
From May 23: Most Kind and Gentle Death
Dear People of Christ Church,
This week, I'm writing early, getting ready to fly to Sweden to be with my aunt Barbro. She was diagnosed with lung cancer this spring and has taken a turn for the worse. I should only be gone for a week, but I do regret that I'll miss our festive joint Pentecost service with St Peter's, this Sunday at 11. Matt is preaching and Rev. Mary will celebrate, so it will still be a great celebration! Norm Faramelli has graciously agreed to take the 8:30 service so there will be Eucharist then as well. Please come!
Meanwhile, I've been trying to justify my time away to my children, who are not too pleased about it. Explaining things to them so often is another way of explaining things to myself; in the midst of creating their own worlds, they ask all the hard questions that help me to consider why I really do believe what I do. Most powerfully, they also keep me accountable, pushing me to re-evaluate the half-truths I'm sometimes willing to settle for. Still, talking about death with a five year old is something else altogether (my 2 ½ year old doesn't get it at all, which is fine!).
Isaiah is quite aware that his Saturday playground plans get put on hold for burials, but trying to explain the matrix of faith and sadness that comes together when one of "our own" is dying is another story. We haven't been to Sweden since 2008-when Isaiah was barely 1 ½--so he has no memory of our family there (my mother's whole side of the family, of whom there are not many more). I have been trying to explain to him how I want to go before my aunt dies, to see her before I can't see her anymore. At the same time, I am also explaining that she will be with God, and that everyone dies eventually, so even though I'm sad, it's not necessarily such a terrible thing because we trust in God's love. I really do believe all the alleluias we throw around at burials in the Episcopal Church.
Still, I'm trying to explain it to him with the background of my own grief; the reason I'm going tomorrow and not waiting until "later" (as I've been putting it off since she was diagnosed) is that her needs are such that she is not going home again, whether she lives for another six days or six weeks. This is the time, and I am incredibly blessed/fortunate/just plain lucky to be able to have a flexible job and a credit card that make it possible. There are not many Johannsons or Irwins, so it's not like I can catch the next family heartbreak at a more convenient time.
Meanwhile, there is that perplexity of "my sorrow" vs. "cosmic joy," not to mention the work my aunt herself is doing. Dying is a verb. Going to be with her is witnessing that. Witnessing, in both senses of the word-to see it, to witness, but also to give witness, to affirm it and show that it is important. Gene Burkart and I were talking about this the other day; in our culture death is somehow left to the experts to "fight." Death is often is seen as happening to us, as though our souls and bodies were not on the same team. I think, though, that death has a lot in common with giving birth-when else are we working so closely with God's work on earth? Both are like standing beside a volcano, both with complexity and grace and risk and wonder.
So thank you for your prayers-especially the wardens, Jonathan and Victoria, who fix everything when I'm away! I'll close with the last verse of the wonderful hymn from St Francis, "All Creatures of our God and King." which we sang a few weeks ago. You can listen to some English children with frilly collars singing it, though unfortunately not all the verses--Click here
And thou, most kind and gentle death,
waiting to hush our latest breath,
O praise him, Alleluia!
Thou leadest home the child of God,
and Christ our Lord the way hath trod
Blessings,
Sara+
This week, I'm writing early, getting ready to fly to Sweden to be with my aunt Barbro. She was diagnosed with lung cancer this spring and has taken a turn for the worse. I should only be gone for a week, but I do regret that I'll miss our festive joint Pentecost service with St Peter's, this Sunday at 11. Matt is preaching and Rev. Mary will celebrate, so it will still be a great celebration! Norm Faramelli has graciously agreed to take the 8:30 service so there will be Eucharist then as well. Please come!
Meanwhile, I've been trying to justify my time away to my children, who are not too pleased about it. Explaining things to them so often is another way of explaining things to myself; in the midst of creating their own worlds, they ask all the hard questions that help me to consider why I really do believe what I do. Most powerfully, they also keep me accountable, pushing me to re-evaluate the half-truths I'm sometimes willing to settle for. Still, talking about death with a five year old is something else altogether (my 2 ½ year old doesn't get it at all, which is fine!).
Isaiah is quite aware that his Saturday playground plans get put on hold for burials, but trying to explain the matrix of faith and sadness that comes together when one of "our own" is dying is another story. We haven't been to Sweden since 2008-when Isaiah was barely 1 ½--so he has no memory of our family there (my mother's whole side of the family, of whom there are not many more). I have been trying to explain to him how I want to go before my aunt dies, to see her before I can't see her anymore. At the same time, I am also explaining that she will be with God, and that everyone dies eventually, so even though I'm sad, it's not necessarily such a terrible thing because we trust in God's love. I really do believe all the alleluias we throw around at burials in the Episcopal Church.
Still, I'm trying to explain it to him with the background of my own grief; the reason I'm going tomorrow and not waiting until "later" (as I've been putting it off since she was diagnosed) is that her needs are such that she is not going home again, whether she lives for another six days or six weeks. This is the time, and I am incredibly blessed/fortunate/just plain lucky to be able to have a flexible job and a credit card that make it possible. There are not many Johannsons or Irwins, so it's not like I can catch the next family heartbreak at a more convenient time.
Meanwhile, there is that perplexity of "my sorrow" vs. "cosmic joy," not to mention the work my aunt herself is doing. Dying is a verb. Going to be with her is witnessing that. Witnessing, in both senses of the word-to see it, to witness, but also to give witness, to affirm it and show that it is important. Gene Burkart and I were talking about this the other day; in our culture death is somehow left to the experts to "fight." Death is often is seen as happening to us, as though our souls and bodies were not on the same team. I think, though, that death has a lot in common with giving birth-when else are we working so closely with God's work on earth? Both are like standing beside a volcano, both with complexity and grace and risk and wonder.
So thank you for your prayers-especially the wardens, Jonathan and Victoria, who fix everything when I'm away! I'll close with the last verse of the wonderful hymn from St Francis, "All Creatures of our God and King." which we sang a few weeks ago. You can listen to some English children with frilly collars singing it, though unfortunately not all the verses--Click here
And thou, most kind and gentle death,
waiting to hush our latest breath,
O praise him, Alleluia!
Thou leadest home the child of God,
and Christ our Lord the way hath trod
Blessings,
Sara+
Friday, March 28, 2008
Practicing Resurrection
I hope this finds you having a joyous and blessed Easter week. In the office, we’ve still been catching up after Holy Week, and I am pleasantly excited about all of the opportunities for outreach that have presented themselves recently. Thanks to the fellowship committee, an idea for providing diapers to local families in need is taking shape in the form of the “Diaper Depot” we hope to open the first week in June. It would operate once a month, in the shape of a food pantry but with diapers instead. Diapers are being collected already. We are also trying to purchase our “Easter cow” for a family in need with the Heifer Project. The Heifer Project operates in many countries to help people become economically self sufficient in providing agricultural education and livestock. See www.heifer.org for more information.
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