Living Like We're Dying

Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

    Last Sunday evening I went to confession to a local priest, and he informed me that a priest of our diocese, Fr. Mike Williams, had passed away unexpectedly.  Fr. Mike didn’t show up for the Saturday evening anticipatory Mass, so they made it in to his rectory and found him deceased.  He was only 60 years old.  I had known Fr. Mike from some of his assignments, and he was a fellow Dean, so we saw each other every few months when we met with Bishop Boyea.  
    I had read the readings for today’s Mass on Sunday morning, so when my brother priest told me that Fr. Mike had died, my mind immediately went to the second reading and Gospel we heard today.  On the one hand, the Holy Spirit reminds us that death should not cause to grieve without hope.  And on the other hand, the Holy Spirit reminds us always to be ready, because we don’t know when Christ will call us to our judgement.  
    To reference a Tim McGraw song, do we live like we’re dying?  In that song, Tim sings about all the things a man does when he finds out he has cancer.  He goes skydiving, Rocky Mountain climbing, rides a bull named Fumanchu for 2.7 seconds, goes fishing, reads the Bible, loves deeper, spoke sweeter, and gave forgiveness that he’d been denying.  But we don’t have to get cancer to live in such a way that we’re ready for Christ to return (nor do we need to skydive, climb mountains, or ride bulls).  
    The things we should commit ourselves to, so as to show we’re ready for our end, includes loving others more like Jesus does (to paraphrase an Eric Church song), to forgive others, even when they’re hard to forgive, to make prayer and the reading of Scripture a priority in our daily life, and to serve the poor in whatever way we can.  Whether it’s our own end of life on earth, or the return of Christ in glory, when we allow Christ to live through us (to reference St. Paul), the end won’t catch us off-guard.  Our life will show that we want to go to heaven, because each day we have chosen to live like we already have one foot in the door to heaven.
    Of course, living each day like it could be our last proves difficult.  There’s a reason why the five foolish virgins let their lamps keep burning.  They figured that they would have time to get more oil before the bridegroom arrived.  But he came unexpectedly, and only those who lived as if the bridegroom could come at any moment were prepared.
    When we hear the parable, if we’re wrestling with the meaning, we probably wonder at the part where the five wise virgins refuse to share.  The parable says that they told the foolish virgins that there may not be enough.  But if we consider the greater meaning, that we need to be prepared to meet Christ at any time, the reality is that we cannot share.  While we do share spiritual goods in the Body of Christ, which is why we can pray for the dead, your judgement is your judgement; you can’t have someone else stand in your place.  You can’t ask for someone else’s commitment to Christ to be transferred over to you.  When we stand before the judgment seat of Christ, He judges us on our actions and our responses to His grace.  Others can help me live a Christ-centered life, but they can’t live that Christ-centered life for me.  
    I used this quote on All Souls’ Day, but St. Augustine once preached, “Admittedly, it is not in our power to determine how our death may come about.  However it does lie in our power to determine how we live, so that we may die without fear.”  When we live as the disciples Christ calls us to be, our end, whether by death or by the return of Christ in glory, should not make us afraid.  Rather, we will welcome it as the culmination, the consummation, of the choices we made throughout our lives.  All those ways that we exhibited patience when we wanted to snap at someone; all the ways we cared for someone who didn’t really care for us; all the donations we made to support the poor and the church; all the times we chose not to hold on to grudges but to forgive; all the myriad ways that we chose light over darkness and holiness over sin will seem worth it, and even will seem so small in the face of what God gives us.  As St. Paul says in his epistle to the Romans, “the sufferings of this present time are as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed in us.”  
    Each day we need to choose to be wise, and to live like we’re dying.  Each day we need to choose to let Christ live through us.  We do not know the time of our end.  Today could be our last day.  Choose to live with death in mind, and death will not catch us off guard or cause us fear, but will be our transition to a better life and a day of rejoicing because we will receive our intended inheritance: life with the angels and saints in heaven, worshipping God and experiencing perfect happiness.