A Season of Life and Death In my experience Easter is not the season for dying - at least not without the realised hope of the resurrection.

But on the international stage we have been transfixed with the huge media coverage of the dying (as a process) rather than death (as a point-event) of the Pope, and in the US, the recent Terry Schaivo case. Others have started the ball rolling (just pick almost at random my blogroll and follow the links) so I won't comment too much - except for noting how dying has become (however temporarily) an issue that we cannot ignore as a culture.

The last enemy, what some might term the last reality, the great leveller. It's something we do our utmost to avoid thinking about, if at all possible. I came across a quote some time back "Every man thinks each man motal, except himself" and yet in the here and now that awareness, that consciousness has been raised into the public eye.

And it's been brought home afresh to me in the past two weeks because, most unsually for the young population in KH, I have 2 deaths and subsequent bereavements to deal with. One frighteningly swift. One still fast. Both opportunities to try to help those left behind remember with gratitude, deal with grief (best defined as "love left over at the end", perhaps) and maybe to try to see the bigger picture.

Delicate times. To hold the most dreaded moments of grief before God, and yet to struggle to find the words that will not only serve to close a chapter and to sum up an individual, totally unique and usually unknown to the minister, but also to plant and water a seed that may blossom into faith and life eternal.

Funeral number 2 tomorrow. Time to write the address... and consider for myself, yet again, how to see God's grace and love in a context where the recognition of Jesus, rather then just the distant, benevolent, Almighty is at best muted, at worst non-existent.

Christe eleison  ¶ 12:59 pm 0 comments