Living and Dying

Thirteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
    As the connection to Christianity dips, many people have developed very weird habits in connection to death.  People don’t want to have funerals any more, or if they do, they have the bare minimum.  Many choose to have a “celebration of life,” (which, by the way, is not what a funeral is) where you simply remember the good qualities of the person, rather than praying for the person.  Or sometimes people will scatter ashes in a person’s favorite nature place (which, for the record, the Church does not allow; not to mention you better hope you judge the direction of the wind as your pouring ashes out of an urn).  Or sometimes people will make jewelry that has little amounts of ashes in a locket that a person wears (the Church also does not allow this).  Or, some people just forgo burial altogether, and leave the urn on the mantle (which is also not allowed by the Church; and, which, if you have seen the movie “Meet the Parents,” can turn out quite poorly, especially if you have a cat).
    I connect the newer, weirder practices that surround death with the waning of Christianity, and Catholicism in particular, because as Catholics, we should live without fear of death or need to create our own new rituals with death.  Why?  Because we’re already dead!  No, this isn’t a weird way in which the TV series “LOST” depicts reality.  But through Holy Baptism, we already died.  We had to, if we wanted to live.  It is Christ’s death that allows us to have life, and we have to join in that death, albeit sacramentally, in order to join in His Resurrection.  That was the point of the epistle today from St. Paul’s letter to the Romans.  In baptism we died with Christ so that we could live in newness of life.  And some religious orders demonstrate this during vows, where one is covered with a death pall and lies prostrate on the floor, signifying that they’re old life is dead.  
    But this death, whether of monks and nuns or those in another vocation, isn’t a death of our biological life, but a death to our life of sin and separation from God.  And the new life that we receive is not like an extra life from a video game, but a new way of life in which we strive for holiness and union with God.  Our new life consists in choosing that which is truly life, that which is connected to God, and rejecting that which is truly death (sin), that which separates us from God who is the source of all life.

St. Pier Giorgio Frassati

    Ironically, it is those who die to sin who are the most alive.  Look at the saints: they live the most invigorating lives!  Those who go from sin to sin exist, but don’t have anything that exciting.  Those who persist in mortal sin are like zombies who still walk around, but they are dead.  The quote from now-Saint Pier Giorgio Frassati comes to mind: “To live without a faith, without a patrimony to defend, without a steady struggle for Truth, that is not living but existing.”  He also said, “Vivere, e non vivacchiare” which means “to live, and not just to get by.”    But when we do not live according to our baptism; when we decide that we choose our own will over God’s; when we go from sin to sin, we just get by.
    Life without the Lord is like “The Wizard of Oz” at the beginning in Kansas (with no offense intended to the State of Kansas).  It’s black and white (figuratively, not literally).  It’s simply getting by on a farm.  It’s not living life to the fullest.  But after baptism, and as one follows Christ, life is like Oz: colorful, exuberant, and overflowing goodness; song, dance, and joy.  What’s odd is that we often feel like black and white is better than color, and death is better than life.
    Sin is like the feeling when you’ve eaten way too much food on Thanksgiving (or maybe on other days of the year, as well): you feel sluggish, lethargic, not really excited about anything.  Life in Christ is like when you’ve enjoyed a good meal in moderation, which then gives you energy to go for a walk, run, or bike ride, or play a game outside.  You have what you need, which then gives you the energy to enjoy life even more.
    So how do we live and not simply get by?  We die.  We die to those things that we know do not give us true happiness.  We crucify in ourselves the anger that flares up at someone who has harmed us; the need (or rather, illusion) to be in control of everything; the greed to take all for ourselves and not share with others; the laziness that tells us not to go to Mass or to prioritize fleeting pleasure over sacrificing for the good.  
    Catholics who live the Letter of St. Paul to the Romans seriously aren’t afraid of death.  Because they’ve already been through it, albeit sacramentally.  If they’re following Christ, then death doesn’t matter all that much, because what comes after death for one who follows Christ is an even fuller life than what we can live here on earth by God’s grace and under God’s rule.  We don’t hasten our death, but we don’t fear it, either.  They don’t make weird rituals for death because death is not all that important to one who has already died.  You are already dead, and are leaning into the new life of heaven by the choices you make (or, perhaps, leaning into the eternal death of Hell by the choices you make).  Life the new life of Christ where death has no more power or sting.  “Think of yourselves as dead to sin and living for God in Christ Jesus."