Dying to Oneself

Death has the effect of purification. It dismantles all false human endeavor. It denies anything other than true self. It reveals our selfish and vain ambition. It leads back to the ultimate core of ourselves–that we are mortal, we will die one day.

Meditation on death does not come by easily nowadays. I’ve denied it for a year and a half. I so dreaded going back to see my doctor for a check-up. Because I didn’t know how I would have responded to a disappointing outcome. I wanted to forget the painful past and move on. I wanted to go back to my old life of building my own tower of ambition. I didn’t want to think about death as all encompassing reality.

With a new doctor’s appointment coming up, as I enter this Passion Week, I am reminded once again of this odd preoccupation of Christianity with death. We worship a God who was crucified and died. Yet we have learned to distance ourselves from Christ’s death. His death is as foreign and detached from ourselves as our own death.

Death is everywhere. It is a cycle of life. The question is whether or not we will accept it. Our preparation for death begins with dying to ourselves each day. Embracing our humanity. Before, I was afraid of thinking or talking about death–it was a bad omen, taboo, a morbid thought I wanted to shake off. That’s how our society wants us to regard it. Focus on life, ignore death. Let the doctors, hospitals, and priests take care of the dead.

It is time to admit it and face it, talk about it. Are we all well-prepared to die? If not, what prevents us from being ready? The cross and the meditation on death challenge this youth-worshipping culture that is in denial of death. Only death will bring life back. Life cannot be resurrected without death. Could it be that Christ’s death also helps us prepare for our own death? Christ’s death does not deny our death. It helps us gaze upon it and not fear.

 

Passing of a friend

I just heard the news of passing of a church member at El Monte. George was his name, who greeted my family with a great big smile on the first day when we visited the church. He had this mustache that reminded me of a Prussian general. With his old age, he was getting weak and fragile. But his mind was alert and sharp, full of humor. He lived through the momentous eras of the Great Depression and World War II. A faithful member of the church, great father, husband, grandfather and great grandfather. A good ballroom dancer–so I heard. I don’t know why his passing is leaving such impact on me. Perhaps I am sensing the passing of that generation with him and passing of history. And many stories and memories with him. If life is every meaningful, that is because of those who are meaning-makers around us. We are all meaning-makers. We search for meaning and purpose of our life. But our meaning and purpose is not found in ourselves. They are found in relationships. We provide meaning and purpose for others. We give others that the world we live is not a little dot in the universe or this gaseous planet with physically qualities, albeit distinctively different from other planets, devoid of any capacity to give us a sense of eternity and why we are here. It is contact with others. When we encounter a sense of humanity in others. When we feel the warmth of their heart and care that can transform the seemingly lifeless, physical world into a home, community, life, and “heaven.” We have created a mechanical world ruled by scientific laws and continue to create the world ruled by machines and technology, where God is nowhere to be found, much less room for our own humanity, which has its origin in God Godself. Because of God’s image imprinted in us, we see God in others. We are reminded of God’s love and care in those who embody the same care and love when we interact with them. When we lose someone we care so much, the sense of loss is so great. The world is not the same any more. With his or her passing, part of our world departs as well, joining the eternity of the coming world. We realize that we, too, are that much closer to the heavenly home.