Our Near-Death Experience

[rodeodance]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/04/09/opinion/09lynch.html?th=&emc=th&pagewanted=print&position=
April 9, 2005

Our Near-Death Experience

By THOMAS LYNCH

Moveen, Ireland — IMAGES of the papal wake dominated the news this week: the dead man's body vested, mitered, laid out among his people in St. Peter's Square, blessed with water and incense, borne from one station to the next in a final journey. Such images - along with the idea that millions of people would wait for hours merely for a chance to pass by the body itself - may have given pause to many Americans for whom the presence of the dead at their own funerals has become strangely unfashionable........

For many Americans, however, that wheel is not just broken but off track or in need of reinvention. The loosened ties of faith and family, of religious and ethnic identity, have left them ritually adrift, bereft of custom, symbol, metaphor and meaningful liturgy or language. Times formerly spent in worship or communion are now spent shopping or Web-browsing or otherwise passing time. Many Americans are now spiritual tourists without home places or core beliefs to return to.

INSTEAD of dead Methodists or Muslims, we are now dead golfers or gardeners, bikers or bowlers. The bereaved are not so much family and friends or fellow believers as like-minded hobbyists or enthusiasts. And I have become less the funeral director and more the memorial caddy of sorts, getting the dead out of the way and the living assembled for a memorial "event" that is neither sacred nor secular but increasingly absurd - a triumph of accessories over essentials, stuff over substance, theme over theology. The genuine dead are downsized or disappeared or turned into knickknacks in a kind of funereal karaoke - bodiless obsequies where the finger food is good, the music transcendent, the talk determinedly "life affirming," the accouterments all purposefully cheering and inclusive and where someone can be counted on to declare "closure" just before the merlot runs out. We leave these events with the increasing sense that something is missing.

Something is.

Just as he showed us something about suffering and sickness and dying in his last days alive, in death Pope John Paul II showed us something about grieving and taking our leave. The good death, good grief, good funerals come from keeping the vigils, from bearing our burdens honorably, from honest witness and remembrance. They come from going the distance with the ones we love.

[monarch]

1. Very interesting observations! n/t

[Mari333]

2. good point

The US culture is often in total denial about grief and death, altho that is changing. Ive been widowed twice now, and people expect me to be "over it" in 2 weeks. When I tell people the grieving time can be up to 10 years for a spouse, they look at me with disbelief. The second time I was widowed, last August, I KNEW what was going to happen after my husbands death..people leave you alone because they dont want to deal with you..I had people telling me to :find someone : and its only been 8 months..people avoid emotional pain like the plague. I know I will never ever marry again, and thats fine by me..but we all need the time to grieve and mourn and in the USA ,fast food nation, its drive thru grief.
I am wiser this time, Im just avoiding people.

[glitch]

3. You are right. Have you ever read any M. Scott Peck? He says the

refusal to deal with pain, and the refusal to do the difficult analysis of complex problems, are the source of evil in the world.

Anyone saying or implying "Get over it" to the tragedies we all face is coming from a very sick base.

[Mari333]

4. read all his books and I agree

people prefer denial. Avoiding pain. Avoiding anything that upsets them, many people.
Old Hindu saying..pain and joy go thru the same door.

[TygrBright]

5. Mari, perhaps you can offer me some advice...

...I just had a close friend die; I knew his wife only somewhat, but we were friendly. In the immediate aftermath of his death (long expected, he was diagnosed with cancer some time ago,) she was pretty overwhelmed with the details-- the wake, funeral, visiting family members, etc. I didn't really want to do more than just attend.

I know that as the stress of the events "wears off," she is going to be feeling the emptiness. She has kids and family nearby; I don't want to intrude on their grief, but I do want to find a way to let them know that John is still in my thoughts and prayers, as are they.

I'd thought to just wait a few weeks, and send a short handwritten note, with a couple of memories about John in it, and letting her know that she and the family are still in my prayers. Since I don't really know her or the kids that well, I don't want to presume on a level of relationship we really don't have, but I do want to let them know John (and they) aren't forgotten.

Is the note a good idea? What would you have appreciated in a similar situation?

I hope you don't mind my asking; I don't want to take advantage of your mourning, but I thought you might "get it" better than most.

diffidently,
Bright