Tag Archives: Communion of Saints

“Everything Is Ready Now” – Towards Living

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Because Lent leads us to think about the Last Four Things, it is a good preparation for life as it is for death.  A little more than a year ago, Richard John Neuhaus died, Jan. 8, 2009.  On that day First Things reprinted an article he published in 2000, Born Toward Dying.(Read here) It recounted his near death experience, which became for him as much a confirmation of life as it was a preparation for death.

Neuhaus recalls the children’s nighttime prayer  “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray thee Lord my soul to keep; if I should die before I wake, I pray thee Lord my soul to take.”

“Death is the most everyday of everyday things. It is not simply that thousands of people die every day, that thousands will die this day, although that too is true. Death is the warp and woof of existence in the ordinary, the quotidian, the way things are…..Every going to sleep is a little death, a rehearsal for the real thing.

Neuhaus surveys our way with death from reticence and silence to “processing”, even to commercial exploitation. Whether your own or a loved one, he writes:

“The worst thing is not the sorrow or the loss or the heartbreak. Worse is to be encountered by death and not to be changed by the encounter.”

Neuhaus writes of his own encounter(summarized):

The days in the intensive care unit was an experience familiar to anyone who has ever been there. I had never been there before, except to visit others, and that is nothing like being there. I was struck by my disposition of utter passivity. There was absolutely nothing I could do or wanted to do, except to lie there and let them do whatever they do in such a place. Indifferent to time, I neither knew nor cared whether it was night or day. I recall counting sixteen different tubes and other things plugged into my body before I stopped counting….

Astonishment and passivity were strangely mixed. I confess to having thought of myself as a person very much in charge. Friends, meaning, I trust, no unkindness, had sometimes described me as a control freak. Now there was nothing to be done, nothing that I could do, except be there. Here comes a most curious part of the story, and readers may make of it what they will. Much has been written on “near death” experiences. I had always been skeptical of such tales. I am much less so now. I am inclined to think of it as a “near life” experience, and it happened this way.

It was a couple of days after leaving intensive care, and it was night. I could hear patients in adjoining rooms moaning and mumbling and occasionally calling out; the surrounding medical machines were pumping and sucking and bleeping as usual. Then, all of a sudden, I was jerked into an utterly lucid state of awareness. I was sitting up in the bed staring intently into the darkness, although in fact I knew my body was lying flat. What I was staring at was a color like blue and purple, and vaguely in the form of hanging drapery. By the drapery were two “presences.” I saw them and yet did not see them, and I cannot explain that. But they were there, and I knew that I was not tied to the bed. I was able and prepared to get up and go somewhere. And then the presences—one or both of them, I do not know—spoke. This I heard clearly. Not in an ordinary way, for I cannot remember anything about the voice. But the message was beyond mistaking: “Everything is ready now.”

That was it. They waited for a while, maybe for a minute. Whether they were waiting for a response or just waiting to see whether I had received the message, I don’t know. “Everything is ready now.” It was not in the form of a command, nor was it an invitation to do anything. They were just letting me know. Then they were gone, and I was again flat on my back with my mind racing wildly. I had an iron resolve to determine right then and there what had happened. Had I been dreaming? In no way. I was then and was now as lucid and wide awake as I had ever been in my life.

Tell me that I was dreaming and you might as well tell me that I was dreaming that I wrote the sentence before this one. Testing my awareness, I pinched myself hard, and ran through the multiplication tables, and recalled the birth dates of my seven brothers and sisters, and my wits were vibrantly about me. The whole thing had lasted three or four minutes, maybe less. I resolved at that moment that I would never, never let anything dissuade me from the reality of what had happened. Knowing myself, I expected I would later be inclined to doubt it. It was an experience as real, as powerfully confirmed by the senses, as anything I have ever known. That was some seven years ago. Since then I have not had a moment in which I was seriously tempted to think it did not happen. It happened—as surely, as simply, as undeniably as it happened that I tied my shoelaces this morning. I could as well deny the one as deny the other, and were I to deny either I would surely be mad.

“Everything is ready now.” I would be thinking about that incessantly during the months of convalescence. My theological mind would immediately go to work on it. They were angels, of course. Angelos simply means “messenger.” There were no white robes or wings or anything of that sort. As I said, I did not see them in any ordinary sense. But there was a message; therefore there were messengers. Clearly, the message was that I could go somewhere with them. Not that I must go or should go, but simply that they were ready if I was. Go where? To God, or so it seemed. I understood that they were ready to get me ready to see God. It was obvious enough to me that I was not prepared, in my present physical and spiritual condition, for the beatific vision, for seeing God face to face. They were ready to get me ready. This comports with the doctrine of purgatory, that there is a process of purging and preparation to get us ready to meet God. I should say that their presence was entirely friendly. There was nothing sweet or cloying, and there was no urgency about it. It was as though they just wanted to let me know. The decision was mine as to when or whether I would take them up on the offer…………………………

Tentatively, I say, I began to think that I might live. It was not a particularly joyful prospect. Everything was shrouded by the thought of death, that I had almost died, that I may still die, that everyone and everything is dying. As much as I was grateful for all the calls and letters, I harbored a secret resentment. These friends who said they were thinking about me and praying for me all the time, I knew they also went shopping and visited their children and tended to their businesses, and there were long times when they were not thinking about me at all. More important, they were forgetting the primordial, overwhelming, indomitable fact: we are dying! Why weren’t they as crushingly impressed by that fact as I was?

Surprising to me, and to others, I did what had to be done with my work. I read manuscripts, wrote my columns, made editorial decisions, but all listlessly. It didn’t really matter. After some time, I could shuffle the few blocks to the church and say Mass. At the altar, I cried a lot, and hoped the people didn’t notice. To think that I’m really here after all, I thought, at the altar, at the axis mundi, the center of life. And of death. I would be helped back to the house, and days beyond numbering I would simply lie on the sofa looking out at the back yard. That birch tree, which every winter looked as dead as dead could be, was budding again. Would I be here to see it in full leaf, to see its leaves fall in the autumn? Never mind. It doesn’t matter.

It took a long time after the surgeries, almost two years, before the day came when I suddenly realized that the controlling thought that day had not been the thought of death. And now, in writing this little essay, it all comes back. I remember where I have been, and where I will be again, and where we will all be.

God bless you Richard John Neuhaus for being a part of my living and laying the ground work for my dying. No doubt we’ll meet someday and know each other in our depths of being;simply a glance will unleash a new joy and speak volumes of God’s mercies and designs.


Please Pray With Me

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A Prayer Request:

Hello to all:

Update on David:  As most of you know, the petscan was negative, which was truly good news.  This means the cancer has not metastasized into any of his major organs.  So, today was the next step – surgery – to remove more tissue from the site and then determine if the lymph nodes are affected.   Surgery took 4 ½ hours and was supposed to take two.  They had to call in a plastic surgeon to help close the wound, due to the size and placement on his back.  They ended up taking biopsies from four different lymph nodes – so he has dressings and stitches and gauze pads all over his back, under his arm pits, and on either side of his neck.  He is a mess!   We left the house at 6:15 a.m. and got home at about 4:45 p.m.  – so it was a long day.

The good news:  The lymph nodes were benign in the preliminary labs.  Final labs will not be in for a few more days, but the surgeon was confident that they are clean “for now.”

The bad news:  Because the initial site was so deep, they are still going to refer him to an oncologist and he will probably have to go through chemo.  Unlike other cancers, melanoma can crop up at any time and in any place (including internal organs) – even years down the line.  There isn’t that “5 year rule” with melanoma.   With other cancers, if you are cancer free for five years, you’re “cured.”  There is no “cure” for this.  He will always have to be checked closely and will have to be diligent whenever there are any external signs.   With the internal signs, sometimes you don’t know until it’s too late.  So the surgeon was not Mr. Sunshine.  He was very cautious and totally neutral.  It was very hard to read him.  The only optimistic thing he said was that Melanoma, unlike other cancers, can often be surgically removed – even from internal organs – without spreading.  So, he said it is one of those cancers where you “never give up hope.”

We will see the oncologist next week.  I will be anxious to hear what they say.    Overall, we feel good and we feel optimistic … but I know David is scared about the chemo and I didn’t leave today feeling like “this is over.”   He is in good spirits and fairly doped up on vicadin at the moment.  In fact, he’s sort of dancing (rather stiffly) to Earth Wind & Fire in the living room with Thomas at the moment.  I just had to yell at him to sit down and be still.   Gees.  What a dummy.

Tonight we have spent a lot of time on the phone to Kaiser dealing with the bleeding.  The major site just keeps soaking through and we aren’t sure what that means.  I’m supposed to be watching for signs of shock, but they don’t want us messing with the bandages.  So, I have a feeling we will have to go back in tomorrow to have it looked at, just to make sure everything is o.k.   He is obviously not in shock at the moment.   Then again… it could be a long night.

For now… all is well!!!

XOXOXOXO

Thanks for your care and concern,

Relics of St. Therese of the Child Jesus

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In celebration of Theresian Feastday, the reliquary containing the bones of St. Therese of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face is carried in procession from the Carmelite convent to the Basilica. As the candlelight procession proceeds through the streets, “Mon Ciel, je le passerai a faire du bien sur la terre” , “I will spend my Heaven doing good on earth” is sung in the convent.

Litany of St. Therese of the Child Jesus recorded by Richard Garnaut.

On Jesus Christ’s Descent into Hell

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From the Dolorous Passion of Jesus – Visions of Venerable Anne Catherine Emmerich.

Our Lord, by descending into Hell, planted (if I may thus express myself), in the spiritual garden of the Church, a mysterious tree, the fruits of which—namely, his merits—are destined for the constant relief of the poor souls in Purgatory. The Church militant must cultivate the tree, and gather its fruits, in order to present them to that suffering portion of the Church which can do nothing for itself. Thus it is with all the merits of Christ; we must labour with him if we wish to obtain our share of them; we must gain our bread by the sweat of our brow. Everything which our Lord has done for us in time must produce fruit for eternity; but we must gather these fruits in time, without which we cannot possess them in eternity. The Church is the most prudent and thoughtful of mothers; the ecclesiastical year is an immense and magnificent garden, in which all those fruits for eternity are gathered together, that we may make use of them in time. Each year contains sufficient to supply the wants of all; but woe be to that careless or dishonest gardener who allows any of the fruit committed to his care to perish; if he fails to turn to a proper account those graces which would restore health to the sick, strength to the weak, or furnish food to the hungry! When the Day of Judgment arrives, the Master of the garden will demand a strict account, not only of every tree, but also of all the fruit produced in the garden.

On Not Judging the Man-Just the Record

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For the record:  judging, discerning, and choosing are part and parcel of life.  From day one, our senses present the world to us and we’re off on the grand adventure.  All is recorded in the Book of Life from cradle to grave.  “Known but to God” can be recorded on every tombstone.  And so, now we come to the death of the “great man”, Edward Moore “Ted” Kennedy.  What constitutes this greatness matters.  Of late, we have seen idols and iconic figures come to their respective ends.  To judge, to discern, to choose is human, wisdom depends on it. Society learns and survives by it.

Let a merciful and just God judge the disposition of a soul.  I’m okay with that for myself and others.  What to make though, of hours and days and in some cases eons of public pronouncements and near cult worship.  Senator Ted Kennedy died and now the myth begins, or has it been spun like a cocoon about him throughout life?  For the butterfly to emerge, the cocoon must be broken.

I’m of the opinion that God isn’t wowed by the Kennedy legacy and I’m certain all spin stops before His throne.  A face to face with God isn’t like Facebook, Twitter or even “Meet the Press”.  Men may flatter us, but the truth is that pride goes before a fall.  Before the Almighty, humility is the better garb.

For my part, I see that Edward Moore “Ted” Kenned, had it all; life lived to the full. He got the chance as the youngest of nine children born to a Catholic mother who practiced her faith, not birth control, to experience family, faith, power, love, fun, sin and foolishness.  He got to make mistakes, ask forgiveness, build bonds of kinship and friendship.  He got to roar like a lion and cry like a baby. I see, too, that this gifted and blessed man, failed to find it in his heart or philosophy to support the unborn, the un-named also conceived by the will of  God, failed to grant them protection or welcome into the same life he so abundantly lived.  May these, the Holy Innocents,  now pray for him, their brother, offering the purest Innocent, the Lamb of God, to a loving Father who even Now, stoops to the lowly when they cry out for mercy.  Lord have mercy!

Ignatius Press sticks to the facts and leaves the funeral fuss, fantasy, and lionization to press, popular myth romantics, and political agendas.

Prayer of St. Ephrem the Syrian

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A Prayer written by St. Ephrem the Syrian:

Grant forgiveness, O Lord, send also strength. Convert me, that I might live in sanctity, according to Thy holy will. Sanctify my heart that has become a den and dwelling-place of demons.

I am unworthy to ask forgiveness for myself, O Lord, for many times have I promised to repent and proved myself a liar by not fulfilling my promise. Thou hast picked me up many times already, but every time I freely chose to fall again.

Therefore I condemn myself and admit that I deserve all manner of punishment and torture. How many times hast Thou enlightened my darkened mind; yet every time I return again to base thoughts! My whole body trembles when I contemplate this; yet every time sinful sensuality reconquers me.

How shall I recount all the gifts of Thy grace, O Lord, that I the pitiful one have received? Yet I have reduced them all to nothing by my apathy — and I continue on in this manner. Thou has bestowed upon me thousands of gifts, yet miserable me, I offer in return things repulsive to Thee.

Yet Thou, O Lord, inasmuch as Thou containest a sea of longsuffering and an abyss of kindness, do not allow me to be felled as a fruitless fig tree; and do not let me be burned without having ripened on the field of life. Snatch me not away unprepared; seize not me who have not yet lit my lamp; take not away me who have no wedding garment; but, because Thou art good and the lover of mankind, have mercy on me. Give me time to repent, and place not my soul stripped naked before Thy terrible and unwavering throne as a pitiful spectacle of infamy.

If a righteous man can barely be saved, then where will I end up, I who am lawless and sinful? If the path that leads to life is strait and narrow, then how can I be vouchsafed such good things, I who live a life of luxury, indulging in my own pleasures and dissipation? But Thou, O Lord, my Saviour, Son of the true God, as Thou knowest and desirest it, by Thy grace alone, freely turn me away from the sin that abides in me and save me from ruin.