The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Salem, Oregon

DEATH IS MY TEACHER

The Reverend Richard R. Davis

Sermon for Oct. 25

            When I was a child we never talked about death in my family.  Whenever my older sister – who liked to push the envelope - would start talking about it, my mother, who worked full time and raised us alone and probably felt overwhelmed by life, would always say “let’s not talk about that right now” which was her way of saying “we’re never going to talk about dying.  It’s a taboo subject.” 

            I shared my mother’s desire to avoid any talk of death.  The prospect of her death hung like a dark cloud over me - she was battling breast cancer.  We were never told how serious this was – the adults in our family system kept us completely in the dark thinking this was best – yet we knew it was serious.   Fortunately, my mother pulled through and lived to a ripe old age. 

            Yet of course she did die, eventually, as will we all someday.  Even young children know that death is real – we can avoid discussion of it, but we cannot banish it from the mind.  Still, I understand the impulse to sweep this fact under the rug.   Death seems to threaten all that we hold so dear.  So our society conspires to focus on other things under the sun – often some pretty trivial things. 

              Even if I wanted to, in my position I could not ignore death.  In the ministry news of death comes knocking on the door on a fairly regular basis.  Every year someone in our congregation dies and every year, some among us lose loved ones.  And I have to say that as painful as it sometimes is to face death with you – most especially when our children die before us – I am grateful that recognition of death is woven so finely into my life.  Why?  Because death is one of greatest teachers.

At our Wednesday evening meditation group we recognize that a regular reminder of death is important, so we begin by reciting “the five remembrances” which the Buddha suggested his disciples ponder upon.  In so many words he said “you’re going to get old (if you’re not already), you’re going to become ill (if you’re not already), you’re going to die just like everyone else, including everyone you love.  All that is dear to you will pass away – nothing is permanent.   The only foundation you can stand on are your deeds.  Therefore, live with virtue.

Then there’s that stark reminder of our mortality early in the book of Genesis where God says to Adam:  “Don’t forget, you came from dust and you will return to dust.”  And there’s the passage where the prophet Isaiah says “For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower thereof falleth away.”  Then, there’s the admonition from the ancient Psalmist who said “so teach us to number our days that we might apply our hearts to wisdom.”

It’s good advice, too often ignored.  It’s generally considered morbid to think about death – and that would be true if it were an obsessive pre-occupation.  Yet paradoxically, thinking openly and honestly death is one of the most life affirming things you can do.  And denying the reality of death leads to a denial of what is vital in our lives. If you do make it a practice to think about your own mortality it will help you maintain a proper perspective and live a richer, truer, fuller life. 

The Buddhist’s have a spiritual exercise that helps here.  First, sit quietly and realize how tentative your life is.   Get a sense of your mortality – recognize that death will come.   We don’t know when we’ll die, but we do know – at least intellectually – that we will die.  Next, imagine yourself at the end of your life.  Now, remember your past and think of two good deeds you have done.  (Now if you simply haven’t done two good deeds in your life – stop the exercise immediately and run out and do something for someone for goodness’ sake – time’s a-wasting).   But most of us can surely think of two good deeds – please, nothing grandiose here – we’re not aiming for the Nobel prize for peace here – just remember two of your basic salt of the earth good deeds.  As you remember these deeds get a sense of how this memory affects you.  There is a flavor of goodness to these memories, that sense of “yes, that’s what’s really fulfilling, what I wish more of my life could be about.”  The awareness of death can remind us of what is important, that time is precious and the our opportunities to be a blessing and not a curse are not unlimited. 

Now if you can’t think of two good deeds that you’ve done in your life this is a warning sign.  It may mean that you’re missing some opportunities to reach out and do some good in your life.  Or - and Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield says this is much more likely – it’s a sign that you’re being too hard on yourself and not recognizing the many simple kindnesses you really do in your daily life. 

Self hatred is endemic in our culture.  Many of us have struggled and continue to struggle with this.  Have some compassion for yourself.   Life is to short to spend it full of self loathing.   You don’t deserve to be treated with such scorn.

Then, too, neither do others.  And death can help here, too.  I have learned that when I see someone or am dealing with someone who is rubbing me the wrong way that if I remember to see them in their full humanity and remind myself that they will die someday and that they have known the pain of grief when they lost loved ones, then the clouds of judgmental thinking are burned away by the bright sun of compassion. 

The reality of death is one of the best teachers of compassion, and as our good friend Hudson Schweikert notes:  “If you want others to be happy, practice compassion.  If you want to be happy, practice compassion.” 

Now I’m not trying to paste a smiley face on the grim reaper.  Death brings profound loss and dredges up deep seated feelings of grief.  When you lose someone to death it hurts, even if you didn’t think a person meant that much to you.

This calls to mind the first funeral service at which I ever officiated – I was just midway through theology school in Atlanta but was called into service when an old  Universalist woman from north Georgia died.  She hadn’t been a member of any UU congregation and the only person they could find to officiate was me.  We need not go into great embarrassing detail here – suffice it to say that I was pretty clueless. 

There we were in the funeral home and everyone was milling about.  I was struck by how jovial everyone seemed – folks smiling, joking, greeting each other like they were a cocktail party, only there was this open casket with a body in the center of the room.  Finally, the funeral director, realizing he was dealing with a rookie, sidled up to me and whispered “Pastor, I think you should have a word of prayer now.” 

“Uh, yeah, sure, good idea.”   So I interrupted everyone and announced, as though it were my idea, “let’s have a word of prayer, now.”  Instantly, there was a dramatic  emotional shift in that room.  All laughter ceased, replaced by looks of utter grief and stifled sobs.  And then I prayed. 

I had been fooled - and not for the last time.  Looking on the surface of life I thought that I was seeing reality, when in fact, there were vast, hidden emotional depths in every person in that room.   The ritual of prayer people gave people the permission to acknowledge and explore those depths, to feel their love and their loss.  This woman’s death and the certain knowledge that she was gone stirred up their feelings of grief – but other losses everyone in that room that people had known.  Memorial and funeral and graveside committal services allow people a bit of time and space to grieve not only one loss, but all such losses.  And feeling your grief is both a testament to you love and a liberating experience.

Death is a good teacher – it reminds us to look beneath the surface to explore the depths and the heights in our hearts and souls.   On the other hand, in a death denying culture people often get trapped in superficiality, pettiness, mean spiritedness and triviality. 

Yet if you listen to death as your teacher you will realize there is no time for this – our time here is limited and opportunities to live and love fully are precious.   

So I invite you to consider, if you haven’t already, letting death be one of your life coaches.   Which is to say, I’m not suggesting you have a morbid pre-occupation with our mortality, but an awareness of it that deepens and enriches your life.

We can each discover our own ways of doing this.  You will not be shocked to hear that I find a particular piece of music of Beethoven very helpful for me in this regard – it’s the final movement (arietta) of his final piano sonata (32^nd)  (I know the beginning so well I can hear it in mind anytime I want.  The mere thought of the music brings tears of gratitude and appreciation to my eyes.)   Beethoven communicates profound and sacred feeling in this music, feelings that lie deep within every human heart.   The music says what cannot be put into words, but let me try just a bit.  This great soul composed this sonata near the end of his life, and there is a poignant, valedictory quality to the beginning of this second and movement.  “Yes,” this music says, “there were certainly moments of sorrow and pain in my life, but I see now that life is very good, very sweet and precious – I can see now that there is a thread of love running through it all and I look back upon it with gratitude. As I near the end of my days I can see how beautiful it is so clearly.”   

And listening to this music I know that it is telling me the truth and my appreciation for my life deepens immeasurably.  I feel so grateful, so blessed.

Let me end now on a personal theological note.  In our covenantal, creedless religious community there is a great deal of theological diversity and thus our beliefs about what lies beyond the portals of death covers a broad spectrum ranging from a belief in personal immortality to a belief that death brings complete oblivion.  As for me, like the poet Wordsworth, I have had “intimations of immortality” and I see death as a transition into a sacred reality beyond imagining, not an end.  We need not be united in our beliefs about an afterlife, but we can be united in the conviction that the end of this one can serve to remind us of how precious the life we have today is.