Dying

by EMMANUEL R. FERNANDEZ 

            From a certain point of view, we should all be glad that we are going to die someday.  It is, in some sense, a blessing that our life will have an end.  Can you imagine what an ordeal it would be to grow old without ever dying, to experience our bodies weakening over the years while knowing that, no matter what happens to our bodies, they would survive for hundreds and thousands of years – for all eternity in fact?  I have heard about some old people in their late nineties who eventually find themselves wishing that God would finally give them their well-deserved rest.  And who can blame them?  It is not easy to grow old, to live inside a body that cannot be prevented from getting sick and weak and helpless with each passing day. There is a limit to what science can do to slow down (much less stop) our aging process and its concomitant pains.  If some old people in their late nineties eventually wish God would at last give them eternal rest, can you imagine how it would feel to turn 250 or 500 years old, with no hope of dying in sight? 

            Some will probably counter:  I would not mind living forever as long as I would not grow old at all, or as long as I would stay forever young AND everyone else stays forever young.  That latter condition (that everyone else stays forever young) is important because it would be horrendous for us to watch our loved ones grow old and die, from one generation to the next, while we ourselves remain young and untouched by time.  It is hard enough to love and lose people to death in one lifetime.  Can you imagine what a scourge it would be to have to do that over and over again in many lifetimes – forever and ever, in fact?  

            I myself would not mind living forever as long as I stay forever young AND everyone else (especially the ones I love) also stays forever young.  Sadly, however, that is not the case with our life.  We all grow old with each passing day.  We all grow weaker, more helpless, more dependent upon other people with each ticking of the clock.  Unless this reality is changed, we should all be glad our life is going to end someday. 

            On top of this very practical reason why we should view death with a sense of gratitude (nay, with a sense of relief!), there is another reason which may not be immediately obvious to many of us:  Death is literally what makes our life complete. Death is what gives our life a form and a potential for meaning. Can you imagine reading a book about a story that will never end, a story that goes on and on over countless pages with no conclusion in sight?  Or watching a telenovela that drags on forever, night after night after night, on your television screen?  Or listening to a piece of music the melody of which has no ending?  The ending of the novels that we read, the telenovelas that we watch, and the music we listen to is what makes them complete. It is their having an end that gives them a decipherable form.  Even if their ending is sad or tragic, the very fact that they have an ending is what makes them interesting and beautiful.  And our life is like that.  Precisely because our lives here on earth will have an end, precisely because they will be “completed” at some point by our dying, we have the opportunity to live them in such a way that they will attain a meaning, a significance, a beauty which they would not otherwise attain. We would never feel the urgency of doing what we want to do and doing what we need to do (in short, the urgency of truly living) if we knew that there would be an infinity of tomorrows during which we could finally do them, if and when we do decide to. 

            Nevertheless, even if we finally open our eyes to the bright side of death as we just described it, most of us will still continue to view death with fear.  And I think there are two main reasons why we shall continue to view death in that manner.  The first is that death always entails some form of pain.  The second is that none of us is really sure about what awaits us beyond the wall of death. 

            Dying is almost always a painful experience – physically, emotionally, psychologically and what have you. Whether it is dying suddenly in an airplane crash or dying slowly due to a lingering illness, whether it is dying by fire or by water or by ice, whether it is dying while one is young or dying while one is old – almost every manner of dying involves pain. And, as human beings, we all want to flee from pain whenever we can.  

            Apropos of the pain that accompanies dying, we can look at it this way:  what is the worst thing that could happen to us as a result of that pain?  The answer of course is that we might die, period.  Perhaps, then, we could look at the pain that accompanies dying as an inextricable part of the path we must traverse to get to our universal and inevitable destination, which is death.  We can also consider this:  God, in Whom “we live and move and have our being” will surely give us whatever strength we will need to “endure” the kind of pain that shall accompany our own manner of dying.  We may not be able to know here on earth why He will allow us to die the way we will; but we can trust that He will make sure that we will be able to “bear” our painful passage from this life to the next. 

            As to the second reason for our fear in the face of death: indeed, it is part of the human heart’s nature to be afraid of the unknown -- and death is literally the Great Unknown.  Up to now, no one has come back from the afterlife to tell us what the afterlife looks like – assuming that there is indeed an afterlife.   Some people claim to have come back from the dead but, sadly, their accounts leave much to be desired in terms of credibility.  We Christians, of course, believe that there is life beyond this life, because no less than Jesus (who, we believe, is the Son of God Himself) assured us so.  But that’s all we can really stand on, in the final analysis:  the firm belief, the unconditional faith in our Lord’s assurance of eternal life.  Beyond that faith, we do not have the scientific proof to back up our claim.  Yet, that is also the case with the other believers who profess a belief in some form of an afterlife, like reincarnation.  They too cannot present scientific proof to substantiate their belief in, say, reincarnation. And, by the same token, even materialists who insist that nothing awaits us beyond this life, that the entirety of our life is extinguished and we literally return to nothingness the moment we die – they too have no scientific proof to put forward for their assertions.  The different religions of the world can, of course, come up with the most persuasive philosophical arguments in support of their respective beliefs.  But the most that these philosophical arguments can do is to show that it is logical/reasonable to hold such beliefs.  They cannot conclusively prove that the afterlife indeed exists (or that it does not exist). Those who think that philosophy can, on its own, answer questions of fact would do well to remember what Bertrand Russell once said of the eminent ancient Greek philosopher:  “Aristotle maintained that women have fewer teeth than men; although he was twice married, it never occurred to him to verify this statement by examining his wives’ mouths.”[1] 

            At the end of the day, therefore, anyone who wishes to find meaning in death has to find his way back to faith:  faith that Whoever created this immense and still-evolving universe with its myriad life forms desires to share Life, not Death; and that the apparent “deaths” that all creatures experience are but stages that they have to do undergo in order to reach the Fullness of Life that The Creator wants to share with them – with us.  Faith that Whoever created this intricate work of both art and science which we call the human being, did not create it for the purpose of playing with it only for a while and throwing it away like a useless toy once He has grown tired of it.  Faith in the repeated assurances given by God’s own Son that death is not the end of our road, and that eternal life awaits those who put their trust in Him. 

            “Do not be troubled; trust in God and trust in me.  In my Father’s house there are many rooms.  Otherwise I would not have told you that I go to prepare a place for you.”[2] Indeed, it is only by putting our unconditional faith in our Lord’s promise of eternal life that we can face death with courage, with hope – and with peace.      

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[1] Bertrand Russell, The Impact of Science on Society (New York:  AMS Press, Inc., 1968), p. 7.

[2] John 14:2.  Christian Community Bible, 35^th ed. (Quezon City:  Pastoral Bible Foundation/Claretian Publications, 2004).