by Fr. Shea
Death is one of life’s greatest mysteries. On the one hand, we know that death is a part of life. For when we look at nature, or any living thing, we see that things have a beginning, and things have an end. We see that things are born, and things die. Yet when we encounter death in a human person, there is always a sense of tragedy. There is always a deep sense of injustice. There is even a sense that death is a reality, yet it is not meant to be. How then, do we make sense of all this?
Given that this is the month of November, and the church encourages us to remember the dead, it is my hope to offer a few paragraphs of reflection on this mystery of death. I hope to offer this reflection on death, using the superabundant light of faith. The purpose of this reflection is to help us to see that we Christians can be hopeful, even in the face of something as tragic as death.
The first thing that our faith teaches us about death is that death was never part of God’s original plan. In the Book of Wisdom, the Bible tells us, “God did not invent death, and when living creatures die, it gives him no pleasure.” (Wisdom 1:13). The book of Wisdom further tells us that, “God created everything so that it might continue to exist, and everything he created is wholesome and good. There is no deadly poison in them. No, death does not rule this world, for God's justice does not die.” (Wisdom 1:14-15).
If God did not invent death, how then, did death enter the world? The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us that death was a consequence of sin.i Indeed our first parents, Adam and Eve, through a primal act of disobedience (Original Sin), turned their backs on God, who is not only the source of life and goodness, but is life and goodness itself. Death, therefore, entered the world because of man’s sin. “For the wages of sin is death...” (Romans 6:23). “Death was
therefore contrary to the plans of God the Creator and entered the world as a consequence of sin.”ii
The good news in all this is that God did not leave us in our misery. For throughout salvation history, God reached out to mankind in a bid to bring us back to himself; to save us from this calamity of sin and death. In his love, God spoke to man in many and varied ways through his prophets, emissaries and seers. The constant refrain though out salvation history, as recorded in the Old Testament, was always the same. “Turn to me and live! I am your God! I created you! I love you! Turn to me and live!” This call from God to his creatures when responded to would usually result in blessings, and when not responded to would result in more death and sin.
The wonder of Gods’ love, however, is that even in our rebellion and non-responsiveness to his call, God did not give up on us. He did not wish to leave us in our misery. God resorted to the radical plan of sending us not just a prophet, emissary, or seer. He sent us his only begotten son, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the Eternal Word made flesh. He is the one through whom all things were made. He is the second person of the Most Holy Trinity. That one, who is God the son, assumed a human nature in the womb of the Virgin Mary and became like us in all things but sin. By his life, he manifested to us who God is. He also revealed to us, who we are. He ultimately showed us God’s love for us, that while we were yet sinners, he suffered and died for us. He who was without sin, suffered the punishment for sin on our behalf, in a radical act of love and self-sacrifice.
Through this freely chosen act of accepting death on our behalf, in obedience to the father, Jesus transformed the curse of death into a blessing.iii “By dying he destroyed our death, by rising he restored our life.”iv Death was transformed by the power of love. By Christ
suffering this dreadful punishment of death, on behalf of sinners, he actually transformed death from a curse, to a blessing, by the power of love. His death is now the biggest act of love known to man, such that man now draws inspiration and life from what was essentially a tragedy. Furthermore, Christ conquered death by rising from the dead, and now that he is risen, he dies no more. Death has truly lost its sting and the grave its victory.
For the Christian therefore, death can be faced with hope because in Christ Jesus, death has been given a positive meaning.v In fact, through baptism, the Christian has already died with Christ! As St. Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans, “Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were indeed buried with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” (Romans 6:3-5). In baptism, the Christian is configured to the death that destroys all death, which is the death of Christ. The Christian is baptized into Christ’s death, and dies with Him, such that when they come out of the waters of Baptism, they rise with Christ to new life. In other words, they are born again. They still live their natural life but are now born again to a new life of faith. The are born into a life in the spirit born of “water and spirit.”
The purpose of our Christian pilgrimage from our baptism onwards, is therefore, to grow in the life of grace received at baptism. It is to keep that flame of faith alive until the end of our pilgrimage on earth, at our death. The purpose of our Christian pilgrimage is also to continually put to death that which does not belong to the new life of grace that we have inherited, (namely sin). It is to put to death, as St. Paul says, “the old self,” by way of the cross “so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin.” (Romans 6:6). This fostering of the Christian life of grace and putting to death “the old self,” is accomplished concretely, by
living the Christian life, faithfully. It is accomplished by going to mass, receiving the sacraments, going to confession, doing penance, praying, acts of charity, loving God, and loving neighbor etc. Throughout our lives, we allow the principle of dying to the flesh by way of the cross, and living in the spirit, to continue day by day so that we grow spiritually, and Christ comes to full maturity in us (Ephesians 4:13).
On the day we die then, supposing we die in a state of grace, we are merely completing in our physical death, a death with Christ, which we had already died at baptism, and a death which was already at work in us to put to death the old self.vi Just like at our baptism, where we died with Christ in the waters of baptism, and rose with him to new life, our physical death becomes the definitive dying to self, and the definitive rising to new and eternal life in Christ, to a heavenly reality where there will be no more suffering, no more sorrow, no more pain and no more death. Death, for the Christian, while still tragic and horrible, actually becomes the gateway to new and everlasting life. It marks the end of our earthly pilgrimage and our entry into eternal life.vii
In all this therefore, we see that a Christian can actually be hopeful, even in the face of the reality of death. While still tragic and horrible, in Christ Jesus, death has truly lost its sting, and has now been transformed and repurposed by God from being a curse, to being the very means by which death itself is destroyed.
i Catechism of the Catholic Church par. 1008.
ii Catechism of the Catholic Church par. 1008.
iii CCC 1009.
iv Catechism of the Catholic Church par. 1067.
v CCC 1010.
vi Catechism of the Catholic Church par.1010.
vii CCC 1013.