Musings - It's all passing away (VIDEO)

A hero's sleep

Have you ever awoken from a dream and wished in the waking you could stay in that dream? The cobwebs of memory falling away, brushed aside by numb hands, a slow mind, eyes blinking back light, and there whispering to the back of your mind, to your memories a voice that says, no just stay here a while longer, don't wake up.

I'm there now. My mind is slowing waking up, I'm struggling to come back to reality. I don't want to wake, I don't want to get up. There is the comfort of fantasy in dreams that just is so appealing. I feel my pillows of life beneath my head and I just want to lay there. I don't want to face the reality of the life before me.

You see, many years ago I folded up my hero's cape, my power to fly, my super strength, my hero's breathe into a steamer-trunk, locked those memories away, and fell asleep. I was like sleeping beauty, or maybe a bit like Odin when he slumbered in his odinsleep. The sweet lulling melodies of a dream world rocked me into slumber, and the mind in all its greatness dozed. And there while dozing, all of who I was passed and I become a sleep walker, almost a zombie. All my super powers were gone, at least those I thought I had. I walked into a dream world where I dozed, snoring softly into life.

I had been a priest. I was a lover of God, passionate, full of faith, inspirational, inspired; proclamation of God's words fell from my lips like the drops of water from a fountain. My eyes believed they could see The Lord - my heart thought it saw angels dancing. I placed my lips on the edge of a silver cup and whispered with the greatest reverence, "This is my blood." I lifted into heaven the unleavened bread, lowered it down to the top of the altar, and bending over it held between my fingers like the most delicate of petals, my priests' robes gently falling about my arms and shoulders like the pall of a funeral coffin, I would whisper, "This is my Body."

I was a good priest, maybe one of the best for a short time. I prayed constantly, daily, hourly. Every time I walked with audible steps on the ground, the sounds of my shoes reminded me of the sounds of Christ's steps as he carried the cross on his shoulder. Seeing a child running to his mother I thought of the Virgin Mary scooping up her Christ Child. When I held the hand of a dying man, his family wailing around me I believed I was like Christ, anointing his head with oil, asking Christ to take the illness of the dying upon himself, to carry the man and his suffering from the bounds of earth so that he might be free to rejoice with God in heaven. I would weep with the family, tears of anguish felt by them pouring from my eyes.

I held the hands of a woman going to hospital the next day asking me to pray for her, to anoint her head with oil. We prayed together, she could not let my hands go. I drew her close to my breast, and held her while she sobbed. I kissed her head and told her that God loved her, that no matter the outcome, she would be free because the Christ had released her from sin in his death. His suffering was her suffering. Her time on this earth was a memory, a shadow and that memory, shadow would pass in the light of the rising sun.

I ran my fingers though the hair of toeheaded children, seeing in their young bright eyes the future of the Church, little bears of God's word and love to the world. I held plump little Mexican babies on the harvested fields in Northern Colorado at migrant camps and believed that each one of them represented the Christ child. I was nervous when their grandmothers would bend and kiss the hem of my pants, but understood too because from the breathe of my lungs, the Words of God would spill out and the plain and ordinary could become divine, the unleavened would rise, the wine would become blood and together we would all live forever.

I believed that while I stood at the altar, with God before me in bread and wine, that I was a time traveler. That while I beheld those mysteries before me resting in silver and gold on the altar, that is bread becoming living flesh and wine becoming living blood, I was standing not only on earth, but one foot was firmly planted in God's holy court. I was a pontiff, a bridge between heaven and earth, and the angels of God walked up and down my shoulders singing holy songs of praise.

I struggled with my own humanity, writing once, "I have failed The Lord and have not answered that honorable and beautiful call to bear witness to The Lord. How easily I fall into sin myself and I look at the armor of my faith and see the tarnish and dents and marks of my own sin upon it and I nearly weep. I should rather to die than to sin, yet even in acknowledging this I still sin. I seek to be a warrior of the Light, but in my sinfulness I plunge the dagger of my own weakness into the very heart of my faith. I should rather die yet I do not."

Yet in struggling in my humanity I was proud, happy to a great priest. I remember the feeling of absolute power knowing that the faithful parishioners clung to my words, sat enraptured of my preaching the Gospels. I sought to anger the faithful, calling them lazy in their love of God so that they would confront me. There in confrontation I would act like their Jesus and flip over their tables of pride in God's house, daring them to fail to see that if they are full of faith they could not but help to abandon all they cling too and fall before God at the altar. I never lost a single argument - but I never made any friends.

I would tell the faithful that their baptisms in water and spirit pulling its wondrous power from the baptism of their Christ made them apostles, great, greater even than those first twelve. I asked a young man once to allow his spiritual power act like a saint, reminding him that his prayer while only a whisper on earth was a shout in God's ear. I begged him to whisper on earth so that God could hear his shouting, pleading to him, please, please dear son, whisper to God for me.

One day I stood at the altar of God, holding in my hands unleavened bread, breathing breathe on wine, and waited to experience a divine mystery. My gold lined robes of priesthood, weighing heavy against my shoulders. The silver cup blinding me in its brilliance. And I waited. I looked out over the rim of my eyeglasses, slipping in sweat on my nose, and spied God's holy people kneeling. Most thumbing through prayer books, some reading parish news bulletins, some asleep, some checking their watches. Then suddenly there were no angels dancing on my shoulders, there was no divine air blowing out of my lips. There was only me. I was coming awake. I placed the stale unleavened bread on its silver paten, hand trembling as I moved the cup of wine, and I knew I had been deceiving myself. There was no God on the altar before me, there was fermented grapes and flour.

That dream was ending, and waking so slowly, seeing the life around me I realized I had been sleep for a very long time, but I didn't want to stop dreaming. I wanted my power, my hero's cape, my power to fly, my super strength, my hero's breathe. That dream I didn't want to end and for a long time I clutched at those dreamy memories, and hoped to stay there, standing at an altar dressed in fine golden treads with old women kissing my hands and feet. But like all sleep that ends, you cannot lay in that bed forever. Sleep eluded me there, and I had to get up.

And so I pulled off, tugging them over my head, the robes of my priesthood, those holy garments setting me apart from the rest of humanity. I packed into my trunk that fine silver cup, my chalice, my vessel of God's blood. I wrapped my white collar representing eternal life in circle of black cloth representing death of sin. I closed the lid of that trunk, and turned back to my bed. I laid upon the soft covers of a life that was easy and dull. There I fell back asleep, and this time my sleep was more dreamless.

You see in my mission, my life as a priest, in my life in God, as a member of the Roman Catholic Church, I had purpose. While that purpose may have been false, not real, at least for me, I was guided. I had a mission, I was going to save the world, or at the very least I believed I could save me. But when looking at the bread and wine, at the faithless faithful, I knew I had been dreaming. But rather than allow myself to wake up, I went back to sleep. For nearly fourteen years I've not thought once of my life as a priest when I kissed the dying, visited the lonely, feed the hungry, clothed the naked, tended the sick, sang with the children, gave to the poor. In fourteen years I've done nothing but lived my life for me. I've given my love to one or two, but as a human on a planet that is broken, dying, lonely, hungry, naked, sick, needing song, is covered with poverty, I've only managed to tend to me. For all my altruistic up-bringing, for all my education, for all my love of service, I have slept for fourteen years caring only for myself.

But I am waking up. I don't want get up just yet, because that dream, that selfish dream of taking care of me is so tempting. That bed is so comfortable, it's too easy to say to myself, just 10 minutes more, please that's all I need. But the last time I woke up, from my dream of Gods and men, I knew I had to.  I knew that my fantasy life as a priest wasn't really rewarding, that I would cause myself to suffer. But rather than fully waking, I rolled over into a new sleep - and it has been almost as unfulfilling as pretending to be god.

In my last 14 years of sleep, I have dreamt of love. I have dreamt of happiness. I have dreamt of knowing peace and joy. I have touched it with my lips on the face of my husband. But those fleeting memories of reality, haven't sustained me. And so I have to ask myself as an atheist, who at one time believed he breathed God's breathe on to bread and wine so as to make it flesh and blood, can I again be inspired to serve? Can I be a great humanist who desires not just to rest in his own bed to dream his sweet dreams but make for this world room for us all to rest and dream? Dare I ask my lovers in life to journey with me into waking, to stumble out of our drowsy sleep and brush the cobwebs of memories away and blink back the sand in our eyes and look at the light of the world dappling our lives around us? I think I can, but I still have to wake up. I have to get past my fourteen years of not being here and rediscover what in that last dream so inspired me to give everything I had away.

My hero's cape, my power to fly, my super strength, my hero's breathe, these things aren't fantasies; my cape is a flag of equality beckoning us to recognize in each other, beckoning me to recognize in each of you, how we under heaven are equal. My power to fly is in the spreading of the words of love and justice with my brothers and sisters. My flight comes in the form of knowledge - that will leap from mind to mind, heart to heart, eye to eye. My super strength is my husband - in my ability to love, his arm to lean on when I am weak, his strength to support me when I am tired. My hero's breath is my power to speak out against injustice. To raise my voice and proclamation freedom for us all, to proclaim that love does not have gender, to proclaim that equality does not have a color or creed.

Be careful now I am waking up. I was great once, if only for a moment. I can be great again, I know it. But first I have to brush the cobwebs away. Wake my numb hands, quicken my mind, look into light, and shout at my own mind, in a voice that just says yes, get up, don't sleep here any longer.

Escape from the Rock

 

Yesterday I blogged about an experience I had as a young seminarian praying over the body of a dead man whose life, name, even corpse faded into nothing. He was a lonely man with almost no family who died in a small yellow, broken house forgotten - no one to weep for him.

As I have been thinking of my experiences as a leader of God's people, now an atheist, I, perhaps true to my Catholic upbringing, keep finding myself dwelling on the mystery of death. Our passing at the end of our lives seems to be much of the motivator for humanity's continuation in belief in the divine. In thinking about death many are afraid, some are excited for they believe they'll live forever, and some are ambiguous, not sure what they're facing. I am in a category that might be a little more solitary - I don't mind death - in fact it will be fine.

I think that much of our experience as faith filled people, especially in the western traditions, is centered around three elements - creation, death, and resurrection/the next life. Philosophies vary from theological system to theological system, but most certainly there is a common drive behind base theology in a mono-theistic and even in some poly-theistic points of view. That common view is the possibility that our lives will continue in some fashion after we expire on this world.

I don't want to wax on the philosophy of death and life, so many philosophers, most better than I have already done so. Instead I want to ponder my own experience of death. I've interestingly enough had several experiences of death, not my own, but in being privileged enough to be asked to participate in the very personal time of a person's passing.

The first time death had a large impact on me was when I still a Freshman in seminary college. Part of our training was to spend each Saturday in ministerial service to the poor, the sick, the elderly, and the dying. One mission I was assigned to was to go on those Saturdays to the mental hospital in St. Josephs, Missouri. We were assigned to different floors in the hospital, some of us visited young people on suicide watch, others visited residents who were there for the long hale due to very deep seeded mental and emotional disadvantages. Now this was 1989, and the state of mental health care was poor indeed.

 

One of my Saturdays I was on the ward for folks on suicide watch and folks who were very seriously clinically depressed. I met a young man named Sandy who had tried to kill himself the weekend prior. We talked for hours about music, life, where he was from, about his hopes and dreams. He told me about his hobbies, his passion for painting, that he was afraid to die, but that he was more afraid to live. I felt a connection to him and loved seeing him. Sandy wasn't much older than I, he was the only boy in his family. He was originally from a town outside of Kansas City. He was a handsome man, he had a sweet smile that seemed to escape from the mask of sadness he wore. When he did laugh, when he did smile, all the sorrow in his face washed away and he filled the room with brightness. Looked back with the wisdom of my years I know now I had a crush on Sandy, maybe the first one I really had for another man. We were friends as much as we could be with him at the St. Joe's Mental Hospital.

These visits went on for several Saturday sessions. I was so excited to have the chance to be a moment of hope, new experience for Sandy. his family wasn't coming to see him, and his ability to leave the hospital would happen only after he was deemed fit to not be a threat to himself or others. We were very closely monitored by the staff at St. Joe's, and after a month or so I was pulled aside by a doctor at the hospital. "Hi, I know you've been spending time with Sandy, I want to warn about him." My mind raced, warn me about what? Sure I could tell that Sandy was struggling with depression and other issues, very serious issues, but at the same time I loved meeting Sandy, he made my newly found ministry as a servant of the church seem so real. "Okay?" was my reply.

"Well I want you to know that Sandy has that disease AIDS and he's dying." I had heard of AIDS of course, but this was still 1989 and at this time the disease was still a death sentence for many, and most certainly it was a stigma related only to gay men. The crisis had already killed so many, in fact Robert Mapplethorpe had just died of AIDS that March, and so hearing this news I was shocked. First, Sandy seemed fine except he was sad. He had told me that he had used drugs to help find escape from his sadness, from his loneliness, so I knew that Sandy had some serious demons. But to think that Sand was dying, it was inconceivable to me.

I told the hospital administrator that I didn't care he had AIDS or any other issue. I was there to care for him, to be his friend, to be a listening board. I was there to show him that someone cared, that someone loved him. I remember driving back on the back-roads of Missouri after hearing Sandy's condition. I had to pull my little crappy car over on the side of the road. I cried. I stared at the Missouri grey sky and asked God why did he allow us to suffer? Why was God going to let Sandy die?

The hospital must have also said something to the monk who was the head of my apostolic program, the person in charge of assigning us to our Saturday ministries. I was reassigned the next weekend to a Catholic nursing home in Maryville, a town much closer to the monastery. It was safe, the elderly loved to pray rosaries, read from the bible and tell stories of their families and children.


Sandy died that spring, I don't know if it was self inflicted or if he had succumb to AIDS. Another seminarian, David, who was still working at the mental hospital came and told me one Saturday evening a month or so later. "Thom, I wanted to let you know that Sandy died last week." He put his hand on my shoulder, an act of kindness. Tears in my eyes, "How?" David, who was a second career seminarian, older than I, shook his head, "I'm sorry I don't know." I felt a tear run down my cheek. "Thanks David." I found myself in the seminarian chapel. I loved the chapel, it was always quiet, I could go there and be alone, and not a soul would bother me. In that chapel, looking at the crucifix I tried to justify Sandy's death in the possibility he would be resurrected. Then there in that chapel I wondered if he had died by his own hand? Would he go to heaven? Wasn't suicide unforgivable, the most destructive act one could commit to God's gift of life? Then I wondered, what if Sandy were gay too? He had contracted a disease that at the time many were saying was a plague given to gay men as a punishment. In that sense then did God decide that Sandy should die?

Even today as I type these memories of Sandy I'm moved to tears. Not because of any theology but because I remember that young man who was stuck in a horrible mental hospital the last days of his life alone in a room with another mental patient. I cry because I wanted to be his friend, but when the leaders of our apostolic program believed I was too close to a person I was ministering to they pulled me away. No other seminarian went to see Sandy, he didn't have any external visitors again for the rest of his life - his family had disowned him, he was in a state institution that painted with broad strokes in its treatment of the mentally ill. Sandy is gone from the earth, and I wonder who else remembers him.

That death seemed so lonely to me and over the years death was lonely in many more instances. I remember Tom, a seminarian who had struggled with a personality that was very odd. He died one summer in between my Junior and Senior year at Conception. Tom had always been held at a distance from other seminarians. He was passionate about his faith, his ministry. He was an odd bird, and had been told at the end of my junior year, his senior year, that he would not be moving forward into graduate school for ministry. That summer he was working for his father, who had a business serving electrical companies. They were using a hydraulic lift to work on wires above head. The tires of the device shifted, Tom was thrown from the basket and died on impact to the ground. What struck me as lonely was that Tom, in his eccentricities didn't have any friends at the seminary. He and I weren't close, but he always smiled, he was clearly in love with his faith. That fall in 1991 we had a small memorial service for him. Following the service a couple of seminarians were mocking him and that they were surprised that college would bother to remember him. I grew angry and reminded them that in their own faith Jesus loved and tended to the fringes of society. They just laughed at me and walked away. Even when Tom was remembered, then in that moment most people who knew him, except his family, laughed at his passing.

So death - our fear of it - in my experience seems to come from our fear to be alive. We are so held back in our ability, our desire to know those people who are outside of our comfort zones. I had encountered hundreds of times since these days death. As a priest I ministered 100s of funerals. I've lost family to death. I've lost pets who were like children to death. As I've gotten older and older I am less inclined to be afraid to die. Certainly in working with faith groups I found many people unwilling to really minister in the areas that seemed uncomfortable.

In the 10s of thousands of years in human history we've been running from death. And in our running, we've created elaborate systems of explaining away the finality of death. Heaven, hell, Valhalla, reincarnation, are all ways to make us feel better about not having fully lived before the bell tolls. My experiences of death, some very personal, others I was on the edges, have all lead me to experience death in the same way. The light of life goes out. That's it. There is no white tunnel of light to greet us. There is no coming back. There is no second chance. Life is but a moment, a flicker of a perfect combination of cells and atoms that for a moment bring awareness and consciousness to beings we call human. Nothing in all my readings on the philosophy of life, death, afterlife, theology, science, have been able to indicate anything other than what we all experience. That when the final breath escapes our lips, the final beat of our hearts thumps against our ribs, we are no more. We're gone. The matter that charged that self awareness simply ceases to charge.
I don't think that that is so horrible. My matter, my material being is what matters while I am aware of it. The final reality that someday my awareness of my situation will end is no sadder than thinking my awareness of my situation didn't exist before I came to be. I do not mourn for lack of life before February 25, 1970, I shall not mourn for my life when it ceases at some time after today. What matters then? For me it's the awareness of life while we have it. I was on the train yesterday coming home from work, and looking at the people standing around me I realized I love humanity. I love its flaws, its greatness. I love that we scurry in our brief moments of existence to connect to one another. I love that we build monuments and temples to our folly. I love that we sing, we dance, we cry, I love that we mourn. The sorrow at death comes because in a world of limitless possibilities, there are limits, defined by death. Those limits piss us off, and we try to find ways around them. But there are no ways around our friend death. But that's okay, because we know this is true. In knowing we cannot escape death we should be moved to love life even more. We should be moved to embrace the humanity around us.

I loved Sandy all those years ago. I am hurt that I was no longer able to be his friend because of fear. I loved Tom too. His weird eccentric life was brilliant, and his death was sad because that life that shone so bright was shut off too soon. But I am reminded by these young men's passing's  and as I say quite often, we are none of us getting of the rock alive.

"Remember oh man you are star dust and unto star dust you shall return."

 

Who Shall Weep for me

In the summer of 1990 the ringing phone drew me out of sleep. I was working as a parish associate at St. John the Baptist in Longmont, Colorado for Father Fox. It was my first "official" job as a seminarian, me having joined the seminary only a year and half prior in January of 1989. I was entering my junior year of college, and the work I was going to be doing was ministerial, tending to the elderly, giving guest sermons and actually doing "good" in the community. I had known Father Fox off and on for some years and knew him to be a good man, dedicated, thoughtful, kind. He was a bit of an odd bird too - he had two Doberman Pinchers and a large parrot. He welcomed me to his parish and taught me much about how a local neighborhood pastor serves his parish and the parish family.

Back to the night of summer in 1990 - Father Fox was off that night, probably visiting friends in the mountains. As a result the emergency phone line was sent to my room at the rectory. It was late when the phone rang, and I knew that it was the emergency phone ringing next to my nightstand.

"Hello?" I mumbled into the receiver. "Hi yes sir this is your emergency phone service, I have the Longmont police standing by on the other line, a detective wishes to speak to you." I sat upright in my bed. "Go on."

"May I patch the detective through sir?"

"Yes of course." The line clicked for a moment then I knew another voice was on the receiver.

"Hi is this the Catholic Church?" A gruff voice intoned.

"Yes, hi this is Thomas Burkett at St. John's, how can I help you."

"Father" I didn't correct him - I wasn't a father yet but this was so intriguing, "We need you to come as one of your parishioners needs last rites."

My mind raced, I knew the lasts rites from the book of prayers for the dying, but I also knew I wasn't authorized to extend them. "Sir, my name is Thomas Burkett, I'm only the seminarian here, Father Fox has left the parish for the evening."

There was a pause on the other end for a moment, "Well that should be fine, to be honest I don't think last rites would work anyway."

I held the phone away from my face for a moment, eye brows up, "I'm sorry?"

"Look, the guy doesn't need last rites because he's dead. His niece is here at his house insisting that we call a Catholic Priest to come and give him last rites so he won't go to hell or something." He sounded nervous. "I'm not catholic but I'm pretty sure that last rites is for someone alive, this guy hasn't been alive for awhile."

Now at this point I could have refused and said I'm sorry there was no priest available at this time, but something in the cops voice told me he really wasn't sure what to do. "I can come." I said without much further adieu. The cop gave me the directions to the house where they were waiting. I jumped out of bed, pulled on my clothes and ran to the sacristy of the church. I grabbed the prayers for the rites of dead, a jar of holy water, and a small Pyx with the consecrated host. I threw on my long black cassock over my clothes and jumped into my car.

The night was quiet as I sped down the streets of Longmont. The town of Longmont was a city on the edge - it was a growing metropolis resting on the edge of beet farms and a large turkey rendering factory. The mix of the rural and the growing city of Denver created a mix of culture that was often at odds. As I drove to the house with the deceased I grew further from the upscale part of town where our parish was, and into a part of town with small post World War II ranch style homes. I looked at the scribbled notes I had as to how to find the house. It was easy once in the area, the police lights swirling on top of patrol cars were like beacons.

I pulled onto the street and exited my car. I was immediately stopped by an officer; I explained to him who I was. He turned and called for the detective I had spoken to on the phone. It was still early enough in the summer that the evening was quite cool, and the black cassock bellowed out around my legs in grand fashion. Standing there in all black, clutching against my chest the red prayer book and gold pyx I must have looked quite a site. I was only 20 years old, and no doubt the cops were thinking I was a child.

The cop greeted me somberly, "Hi Thomas. Look his niece is standing up on the front porch, she's pretty upset so I think anything you can do will help." I looked at the house again. In the pale light of the street lamps it was yellow. The short chain link fence that around the front yard was slumping in several places, broken in others. The house clearly was in disrepair - the shingle roof missing several shingles. I walked up the front path to the porch. I stepped onto the wooden steps of the porch they squeaked in protest to my weight. The yellow bulb of the porch light illuminated us in unflattering light. A small woman stood with her arms wrapped around herself a tissue hanging from her fingers.

I extended my hand, "Hi, I'm Thomas Burkett from St. John's Catholic Church, I understand you've sent for someone to do last rites?" She wiped her nose with her tissue, dried tears visible on her face. "Hi," she quickly took my hand and then as quickly pulled back from me. I looked through the door of the house and saw old wore furniture peaking out from behind the front screen. "I used to come to see him all the time, but lately I've been so busy, I haven't had the chance to come in some weeks. His neighbor called me yesterday to tell me she hadn't seen him in a long time." She look at the ground, "I should have come more often, now he's all alone." She looked up at me, her eyes wet with new tears, "Please tell me that he won't go to hell?"

I glanced away from her, back into the house, "I'm sure he won't go to hell." I shuffled the holy book to my other arm, "I'm here to pray from him and for you if you want."

She sniffled again, "I can't go back in the house, it's too awful. Please promise me that you'll do last rites for him so he is sure to go to heaven." The new tears dripped down her chin. "I can't go back in, it's too awful." Repeating the sentence again she seemed even smaller.

I looked into her lonely eyes and promised. Of course I couldn't do last rites, even if I had been a priest as last rites are reserved for the living. I didn't tell her that though. I felt the cop standing behind me. He pulled my arm and lead me into the house.

Immediately the putrid smell struck my nostrils. I had smelled death before, but never like this. The small house reeked of it and my eyes immediately teared up. The cop shook his head. "I guess the neighbor called the the niece when they couldn't see him moving around anymore. I'm sure they noticed the smell too. Sad thing is that they haven' checked on him in a long time." The cop lead me further into the house. "He's laying in the bedroom, it's a pretty troubling scene, are you sure you can do this?"

I wasn't sure, but here I was for the first time in my newly started life as a minister ready to try. I had never been in this type of position where everyone was expecting me to do something - help - pray - make a difference. This was a thrill for me. I nodded my head, comfort being found in the prayer book in my hand. "Okay then Thomas, he's back this way." The cop lead me down the very narrow hall, the smell growing worse as we went. "Have you ever seen a dead body?" I had, at funerals. I nodded. The cop grimaced, "Not like this you haven't."

We arrived at the bedroom door, another cop was just exiting. They exchanged confirmations that the investigation was complete and I could go in. The detective who called me stepped back and I saw into an unadorned room with a body laying on a twin bed. The smell was strong enough to water my eyes. The room was illuminated by a single bulb hanging from the ceiling, casting horrible light throughout the tiny room. The bed was unmade, the sheet pulled back around the body.

I stepped in trepidatiously and walked to the side of the bed. There laying before me was an old man, his arms were crossed on his chest. The flesh was tight across his cheeks, grey whiskers indicated he hadn't shaved in some time. He was very small, he looked very dry. His eyes slightly open were milky white, no color could be seen there. I looked at this old man, in his bed, forgotten for a couple of weeks, dead for days. I didn't know what to do, and for a few long moments I just stared at death.

This man, whose name today I cannot remember had died alone, forgotten, in his small run down house. He died on a single bed, surrounded by people who didn't know he had gone until they thought they noticed a smell, until they noticed that mail and papers were piling up. This old man who had no family other than a niece who was too busy to call and check. This old man who didn't know a soul except his own. I remember looking around the room he had died in, there were no images of family scattered about, the room looked more like a hotel room. There was a simple cross on the night stand, a small 13 inch tv at the bed's foot. This man died and there was no weeping or wailing. I offered the prayer of committal:

May choirs of angels welcome you
and lead you to the bosom of Abraham;
and where Lazarus is poor no longer
may you find eternal rest.

The niece crying on the front porch was crying because she hadn't been a good family member. Her concern wasn't for the living, it was for the dead. The life of the man in this small room was gone and there waiting outside for a young seminarian to cast some sort of magical prayer to promise eternity to a dead man stood a woman who didn't know the meaning of her own faith or that of her uncle. For a minute in that small room looking down at the drying husk of a man that I would never know I was profoundly alone. All the prayers in the little book I held next to me didn't carry me away, they didn't offer comfort to the dying. The niece who maybe could have been ministered to was so guilt ridden she could not be comforted by someone like me.

In someway I could hear death whispering into my ear - reminding me that he was coming for me too, not there maybe, but for sure somewhere else. This event has shaped much of life since. A reminder of the gift we have today to live in the moment. I looked down at the dead man alone and knew that I would want to ensure when I died someone would weep for me.

I wrote the below poem several years later.

Something reached around my neck,

it was Death's Sweet embrace.

Icy Fingers touching, holding,

smoothing my face.

I turned my head away -

held my arm out

as if to say

No not you!

I have nothing to give of

not my life for sure

just simply my love.

Death withdrew,

his black cape to hide,

he would stop and wait

he could bide.