Cody
Williams
On Death and Dying
They carried the body of Pope John Paul II through Vatican Square serenaded by the beautiful chant of Gregorian monks. Heisted above their shoulders they carried him through throngs of mourners as billions of people watched worldwide. The pallbearers pivoted at the top of the stairs approaching the doors of St. Peter’s Basilica, they turned the dead pontiff to the world and dipped the foot of his bier slightly, as if for John Paul II to say his final farewell.
Days earlier John Paul -- weak and stricken -- attempted to address Easter celebrants gathered in the square but he could not. Age and Parkinson’s disease had taken toll on one of the world’s most spiritual of leaders, the Vicar of Christ, head of the Holy See.
Both in sickness and death John Paul taught lessons to those of us willing to heed them.
Fittingly, as if divinely scripted, his earthly end interrupted a fierce end-of-life debate here in America, as politicians and talking heads, who too often do, fought for media time to weigh in on one side or the other in Florida’s Terri Shiavo’s -- depending on how you looked at it -- “right to die” or “murder by starvation” debate.
Medical science, ethicists, folks stopped on the street, and ironically, Christians, were torn apart as to whether or not Shiavo’s legal husband had the right to hasten her death by removing a life sustaining feeding tube that had nourished the brain damaged woman for fifteen years while she languished in a ‘near’ comatose state. Some doctors said heart failure at age 25 had caused her brain to turn to mush. They labeled her PVS for being in a persistent and permanent vegetative state. Other doctors held out hope that with proper care and treatment, even after fifteen years, she could be rehabilitated back to near normal health.
Terry’s birth family fought to keep her alive. The US courts however came down on the side of her husband and agreed that she should be allowed, after all those years, to die with dignity, if not in peace, (as if a dignified death was possible with the media encamped outside her hospice).
The feeding tube was removed dismaying the circus of protesters, complete with bible totting evangelists, jugglers and snake charmers, gathered outside what would become her death chamber. Columnists and commentators weighed in. Terri and the pope died days apart: one with dignity, the other swarmed by the ignominy of the foolish.
John Paul’s lesson, at 83 years old, feeble and bent by life, in being wheeled over to the window of his apartment and unable to speak to adoring masses, was that sickness and dying are a part of the cycle of life. Yet, we fight both. Ministers of today’s mega churches actually preach that sickness is of the devil, not of God. I’ve heard some even say man was not ever meant to die.
In dipping the dead pontiff’s lifeless body towards a witnessing world we were shown each of our eventual fate. Life supporting feeding tubes, respirators and medical techno-marvels notwithstanding, death for each of us will happen.
Particularly disheartening was seeing ‘Christians’ enter the fray against Shiavo’s husband. Many called him a murderer and railed against her dying with near frantic gnashing of teeth and public wailing.
Christians, it is written in the Bible, are to mock death, not fear it.
“Oh grave, where is thy victory?” “Oh death, where is thy sting?” Biblical authors penned.
For a group of people who say the ‘believer,’ in dying, goes from ‘glory to glory’, and to an ‘eternal life’ spent basking in the comfort of Almighty God, why fight so hard to keep alive someone trapped here on earth in clearly a medical and tortuous hell? Terry’s blood family urged courts to let them take care of her, feeding, dressing, and changing her daily, as if she were a potted plant or window ledge herb garden – making sure she was watered daily and received proper sunshine. They were reluctant to let her go.
The woman was trapped in a body that didn’t allow her the dignity of controlling any bodily function, cleaning up after herself, or the pleasure of tasting a strawberry or the joy of stroking a child’s head. Surely this Christian heaven would be a much better place.
In life John Paul II taught that suffering is redemptive. In spite of his ailments he lived to his fullest until his body no longer afforded him that ability. Life, as a Christian, lived to its fullest, can and should be fulfilling under all and any circumstances, no matter how adverse.
Paul, the New Testament writer wrote, “I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances. I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength.”
Life ain’t always perfect. Too often it is far from it. But we still should always appreciate life, and yes it to be treasured and championed. (How can anyone who fights for the sanctity of life defend the death penalty?) Too many of us, (mostly people of color) are shown daily that our lives mean little. We should also be just as comfortable accepting life’s end. Death is a part of our cycle of being.
At the window struggling to speak to masses that wanted desperately to hear him, John Paul II was very much alive. Stiff and stretched out on a board being carried across Vatican Square his death was apparent. Suffering is one thing. Death is another. Unable to savor the taste of fresh fruit, understand a loved one calling our name, unable to hope or distinguish sleep from being awake, unable to feel the pain of a skin prick or knife cut, having a brain turned to putty, heaven’s call is not only a loving choice, but a death where the grave has no victory, dying has no sting.
Philippians 4:11
© Cody Williams 2004
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