November 5, 2025

Wednesday Word . . . Death

Nobody gets out of here alive.

Over the last few days I’ve been thinking a lot about death.  Last weekend was the triduum of All Hallows’ Eve, All Saints’ Day, and All Faithful Departed (or Day of the Dead).  On Saturday afternoon I attended a gathering sponsored by Hospice advertised as a “Death Café,” where people come to discuss death and dying.  Later that evening I got a call from Mary Fowlkes’ daughter-in-law saying she had taken a turn for the worse, and I’ve been to Amie Holt each day to check in on her and pray with her.  Sunday we commemorated All Saints’ and All Faithful Departed where I read the names of those who have died this past year at the beginning of the liturgy and which included the baptism of the perfectly adorable Astrid Grant.

Death is an unavoidable consequence of life.  Where there is life, there is death.  That has been the case from the beginning and will continue to be the case until the very end.  So, with the biblical exceptions of Enoch, who “walked with God, then he was no more because God took him,” and Elijah, who ascended to heaven in a whirlwind, everyone dies – even Jesus.

But death is not to be feared.  Even though we die, my faith tells me that my Redeemer lives and he will raise me up.  My faith tells me that Christ has destroyed the bonds of death and that we will live in the glory of the resurrection.  My faith tells me that even though all of us go down to the dust we will make our song, “Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia.”

Let us remember that we all die.  Let us remember that death is no more to be feared.  Let us do our best to prepare ourselves and our loved ones for that time.  Let us live in a way that emulates Christ.  And, at the last, let us live and die in the hope of the resurrection.

Blessings,