It would seem that we cannot help but be fearful of death. We don’t understand it and we don’t know what to expect from it. It is a mystery inasmuch as it is a definite reality for all of us. We grieve over the loss of loved ones who have died and we (if we allow ourselves the reflection) wonder and lament over our own impending deaths? What does life after death mean? From the Christian standpoint, what is Resurrection? Sometimes the questions are as important as the answers, when we allow them to challenge us in the authenticity of our daily lives. How can we live with or bear the mystery of death in a way that can give life?
In the Scriptures for the 10th Sunday in Ordinary Time, we have two stories of death, both involving a widow, her son, and a prophet. In the first reading (I KGS 17: 17-24), we hear the story of the prophet Elijah, who is sent to stay with a widow and her son. For him, this may seem a strange request, given the impoverished vulnerability of a widow in that society. A widow was one of the most vulnerable and therefore also one of the most exploited persons in that patriarchal society, with the death of her husband essentially stripping her of all economic livelihood. A widow’s only hope for support would come from a son. So, as the story goes, this widow of Zarephath has a son, who after Elijah’s appearance, gets sick and dies.
Her response to this “prophet,” was less than understanding,
“Why have you done this to me, O man of God? Have you come to me to call attention to my guilt and to kill my son?”
Elijah also then becomes exasperated and after carrying the child, whose breath has ceased, to an upper room, proceeds to “have it out” with God:
“O LORD, my God, will you afflict even the widow with whom I am staying by killing her son?”
“Why, why, why? Why is this happening? If I am a prophet, why am I being led to a widow and actually depending upon her to support me, when she can’t even support herself? And now, her only hope for support, her son, has died. I have become a burden in an already seeming impossible situation. This is ludicrous.“ …these may have been some of the thoughts going through Elijah’s head at that time.
But, Elijah did what he could in confusion and in trust…
Then he stretched himself out upon the child three times and called out to the LORD: “O LORD, my God, let the life breath return to the body of this child.” The LORD heard the prayer of Elijah; the life breath returned to the child’s body and he revived. Taking the child, Elijah brought him down into the house from the upper room and gave him to his mother.
Then, the story is repeated in Luke’s Gospel (LK 7: 11-17), when as Jesus arrives at the city of Nain, he witnesses “a man who had died… being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow.” We hear how Jesus, upon seeing the widow, was moved with pity and tells her, “Do not weep!”
“He stepped forward and touched the coffin; at this the bearers halted, and he said, “Young man, I tell you, arise!” The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.”
I am struck by the image of “carrying” in these two stories – Elijah carrying the child upstairs and the townspeople carrying the dead young man out of the city. How do we “carry” death? How do we go forward or even go on in the face of death. The death of a loved one, and the overwhelming grief that comes with it can seem crushing and debilitating. Even the “deaths” that we experience every day, when we realize that we have been hurt, rejected, exploited, judged, or looked over, or that we have failed in this or that, we have let that person down, we have hurt this person, can all seem just too much to bear. But we have to “carry” or “bear” these deaths. We need help. We cannot do it solo.
How can we carry “death” for each other? Is it consolation, support, affirmation, encouragement, forgiveness? But even more than this, how can death be “carried” in a way that breaks forth into new life, resurrection, and transformation? Could it be that we are all “widows” in some sense? In a sense, death “widows” all of us. And could it also be the case that we are all “prophets. We need to heal others as much as we ourselves need healing.
In the first years after my brother died, my focus was on how he was “gone” from my life and the life of his family and friends. It took years of prayer and support for me to begin to realize the risen life that was there… or here! And it wasn’t just the risen life of my brother, but for me also, and even others. It was all of our resurrection connected! I could begin to see that I had been trying to “carry” or “bear” the death alone and in a way that prevented any newness to be born. Friends, family and community were “bearing” this as well, but I just didn’t see it. At some point, like the Gospel story, Jesus touched my “coffin,” I halted, and realized that there were others around me, carrying “death,” and I realized what “new life,” could mean.
Can we touch each other’s “widowed death,” so that new life can rise up and begin “talking?” Is this one way of being a prophet – to creatively support and heal each other, like Elijah “stretching himself” over the child – not trying to get “around” death but going through it together. Bearing in patience and trust that God is here right now, in this brokenness, and allowing God’s spirit to breathe new and unexpected gusts of life into the empty lungs of our despair. Then we can let the “new life,” like the revived son in the Gospel, “sit up and speak!” So, then it becomes true that we carry death only so that we can receive and give New Life.
When this happens and we realize that this is happening by participating in it, we can say just as the Scripture characters do:
“God has visited his people.”
Peace
Thomas