Death and Dying - The Final Chapter

LETTING GO The Final Chapter of Love

Dr Stanley Arumugam

13 May 2018

One day we will all die.

Before that day we will be called to witness the dying and death of our beloved.

They will ask us to let them go.

They will be asked to let us go.

Sometimes we won't have the chance to say goodbye at the moment in between But still, at another time, place and season in our lives - we will still be asked to let them go. This is the final chapter in our mortal love story.

For some this final chapter comes to an abrupt end.

A shocking stop.

A death bang.

A crashing full stop.

A whole chapter is suddenly written in a few dark lines. Death unexpected, sudden, devastating, beyond words. We stay frozen in an icy moment in time. This was not their time we protest. Like a thief in the night, death sneaks into our lives and silently steals our beloved from us.

Forever.

We stand in stunned silence.

Unprepared.

For others, the final chapter is long and arduous, like the unrelenting constancy of the waves. The ups and downs of a roller coaster. We vacillate between hope and despair. Between good days and bad days. Some days we wish the bitter cup of

suffering is removed from the lips of our loved ones. Some days we wish it is removed from our bruised bleeding lips.

For others the dark night is short.

A season of Life in which we anticipate the time of dying. We make peace. This doesn't take away the pain of impending loss.

We don't know the day of emptiness. We know it is coming. We wait for the last breath.

For some, it comes as a peaceful night.

For others, it comes as a daily weakening.

A painful slipping away, out of consciousness. The breath wavers, lingers and let's go.

Whatever shape or form the end takes - we are never prepared.

Deep in us is the instinct for life and living. We hold onto this - it is all we know. This is why the pain of suicide is so unimaginable. When the darkness of the night so overwhelms the light of the day. Death becomes the only way into the new light.

From the time we grow up we've witnessed dying and death.

We attend the funerals of loved ones - grandparents, uncles and aunties. We hear of our parents talk of friends they lost. We bury our dogs and cats and get a bitter taste of letting go as children.

As teenagers, our worlds come crashing down when we experience break-ups. For some as adults the pain of separation so much - they take their own lives holding in death what they lost in life. From an early age, we witness death and dying.

It's all around us if we are aware.

In the seasons of spring, summer, autumn, winter. The cycle of life and death continue. We see it in the galaxies, in the dark night and the bright of every new day. We hear it in the approaching and retreating waves. We see it in the bright blossoms and decaying branches. We have the gift of witnessing. It's not that we don't know. We don't want to.

We are not prepared when it's our time.

We can witness the collective death and dying on our big plasma screens. Eighty-one killed in a night bombing raid in Syria.

Starving children die in impoverished countries. Suicide bombers take their lives and of others in a holy pledge. Protestors killed by the occupying forces. Rapes, murders, cruel violence daily. We become numb, indifferent. It's happening out there, to them.

We are not bad people.

If we took on the pain of everyone that is dead and dying we would go crazy. Our minds are not wired for witnessing death at such a scale. We were not meant to become celebrated war veterans whose badge of honour is the memories of comrades/beloved - dead and dying.

Proximity is everything.

When death and dying come to our community, to our village, to our household - something shifts in us. We become part of the story that others witness. We are the story.

We are never prepared to write the final chapter.

Like reluctant writers, we are handed over the ink, pen and paper by the angel of death. We are asked to write.

We write slowly, protesting the pain.

We write our anger and sense of betrayal. We write our regrets as ink blotches touched with our tears. As we write so more, we start to write of blessed memories, of tenderness, faithfulness, joy and love. We the reluctant writers write the final chapter: biographies of our beloved.

Some of us write short, others long.

Each word poignant in personal meaning.

Some choose poetry - in painful powerful lines.

Others prose - stories of days and nights.

Others write in deep silent prayer etched on sorrowful hearts.

Others write their loved ones in memorials of rock and wood, sand and stone, in plants and trees.

Others hold it all in - in a big deep breath never to let go.

Slowly dying inside - holding on to the last breath of our beloved in our hearts.

Yet others, pen in hand waiting for the blessed muse, to take away their writer's block of terror.

To allow them the courage to write the last lines. Some afraid that in their writing they seal the death of their beloved. That this is their complicity in the ending. That they will be forever forgotten.

For others, the pain so deep, the heart willing but the mind

trapped in holding on. Frozen - pen held mid-air, afraid to touch the writing sheet.

On a dark lonely night surrounded by his disciples, Jesus prayed.

His anguish so deep, droplets of blood covered his face. He faced his dark night. He was overcome by the torment of fear, the knowing of the impending hours of torture, humiliation. A desperate loneliness lingered deep in his soul. He did not choose to be a martyr, a hero-God. He prayed as a vulnerable child.

Father take this cup of suffering away from me. It is too hard, too harsh, too much for me to bear. In that moment of deep desperation, he remembered his love for us - His beloved. He chose to let go of Life so we may have eternal life in His death.

He let go to let be - what was to come.

His beloved disciples watched from a distance.

They were confused, afraid, shocked, angry, sad, broken. That night they became reluctant witnesses of His dying and death.

They were close yet far, present yet hiding. This was all too much for them to bear. He told them these things would happen, that His hour will come. In the midst of his darkness, He encouraged them not to be distressed. This was not the final end.

Like us, the disciples were not ready to write.

They reluctantly take up the red ink and crimson white paper and slowly start to write with Roman nails. They write the final

chapter of a friend and a brother who walked with them. Their beloved who lived and now was dead.

When the final chapter was sealed with the END, darkness came over them. All hope was lost. They walked back to what they knew with aching empty hearts. The long days felt eternity.

But all was not over. A new day dawned.

A new day - beyond their wildest imagination.

A day when He was resurrected from the grave.

Over the short time – the days in-between the earth and heaven, he reminds them of what was etched on their hearts. They were drunk with His presence filled them with deep amazement and astonishment. Words cannot capture the joy of the Beloved in their reuniting.

Then He leaves again.

He promises they will be forever united beyond flesh and blood.

And we celebrate the memory of this union in the Holy Eucharist - bread and wine made alive in death and dying. He invites us to remember.

To remember Him and our beloved - those gone ahead.

The best gift we give our beloved is to be part of their story.

To be part of their remembering.

To be part of the divine writing.

We write with ink of blood and tears on the white paper: On the linen of hospital beds, On nurse’s night notes On stained polystyrene coffee cups.

On police affidavits and death certificates.

On glowing digital SMS screens...

We write in tributes and obituaries.

We write in flower gardens.

We write in paintings and poetry.

We write in long walks, on long nights.

We write in the birth of a new baby.

We write in the carpet of Jacaranda blooms.

We write on wet seashores.

We write in whispering clouds.

We write on the pages our hearts.

Keep on writing friends.

Our healing comes with every word, punctuation and paragraph.

We write the story of our Beloved.

When we look closely again, we see the final chapter of our Beloved is transforming in us - a new chapter. Our lives rewritten by the Holy Spirit every day we pick up the healing pen.

When it’s our time to let go When we will write the final END. The story is just mystically to start over again.

Like the seasons of wounding and healing - death and life.

Take a moment and listen to your heart.

We are encouraged by an angelic host and the Triune Muse to keep on writing.

When we look beyond the blur of our salty tears, we see standing in their midst our Beloved becoming clearer line by line. They together with the chorus of divine beings inviting us to transform from reluctant writers to resurrection writers.

The END Becoming a New Beginning.

One healing Word at a time.