Death is Not Normal

A few months ago, I attended a funeral celebrating the life of my aunt who died way too soon. Cancer took her life, leaving my uncle devastated in its wake.

Earlier this week, I attended a funeral celebrating the life of a friend who died way too soon. Aggressive brain cancer took her life, leaving her husband and children feeling the depths of her absence. 

25 years ago, I attended a funeral celebrating the life of my best friend who died way too soon. Congenital heart disease took his life overnight, leaving friends and family confused and disoriented. 

You could fill in your own stories of experiencing loss, of dealing with the death of a loved one, of mourning someone who left the land of the living earlier than expected.

There is something inside each and every one of us that knows, deep inside, that this isn’t the way things ought to be.

In between my aunt’s and my friend’s funeral, I attended a funeral celebrating the life of my wife’s great aunt who lived well into her nineties. And while there was sadness at her loss, the service felt different. Different, in part, because she lived a full and rich life. It was one of those occasions where you felt like you just came to the end of a good novel, coming to the last page with a sense of satisfaction and depth, glad that you took the time to read it.

But these others? Those are books where the last page isn’t written, where you’re mid-chapter and suddenly the words drop off the page, with no closure to the story – just an abrupt end. 

It leaves us feeling robbed, and for good reason.

There is something inside each and every one of us that knows, deep inside, that this isn’t the way things ought to be…

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About 18 months ago, my wife and I went to Scotland. One of the things that struck me as odd was the consistent placement of gravestones adjacent to the churches.

I found it odd that, as I would approach the entrance to a chapel, I would be affronted with death. I don’t know why I found it unsettling, but it struck me as odd that as I would enter a place of worship, I would be required to observe markers of the lives of those who had entered the same doors as me.

Perhaps it was unsettling because, deep inside, I knew I wasn’t any different than they were – that my fate would, as surely as the words written in stone, follow a similar path as theirs, ending in the same surefire finality.

I contrast this with our current culture’s trend to position burial places on the outskirts of town, far away from public view. These days, you often have to make a considerable effort to go to a cemetery.

We have carefully hidden death from our present realities.

Is this what’s best?

I find it fascinating that, in those ancient chapels, on the road to worshipping the infinite, they would be required to face the realities of the finite.

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And so I wonder.

I wonder what happens to a society as we work so hard to deny and hide the realities of death from our day-to-day.

I wonder how that affects the way we engage with the present.

I wonder how the denial of the finite affects our awareness of the infinite.

I wonder if we might feel more of a sense of urgency in the things that matter most.

It reminds me of William Wallace’s observation, quite possibly eyeing the very same gravestones that I did, when he said, “Every man dies. Not every man really lives.”

Janis lived.

Jennifer lived.

Mark lived.

Norma lived. 

All of these lives shared a common thread: all of them kept their eyes fixed on the God of the infinite, who reminds us of the gifts to be found within the finite.

Every single one of them really lived.

And Janis, and Jennifer, and Mark, and Norma all believed that the end date on their gravestone actually marks the start date of a new life above. One lived in the warmth and light and joyful comfort that can only be found in the presence of the Infinite.

And there is something inside each and every one of us that knows, deep inside, that this is exactly the way things ought to be…