“Who is that?” I asked my husband. Someone was texting him, it’s not that common.
“Guy I worked with for a few months. Got cancer. His wife had cancer and now he has cancer.”
“Oh no. Is he in the hospital?” I thought we might visit him.
“Don’t know. This is a big dude. BIG. I saw picture of him. He put on on facebook. I don’t have facebook, but someone showed it to me. He’s lost all kinds of weight. Like ninety pounds or something.”
“He’s dying.”
“I guess.”
“I told him I saw his picture – how much weight did you lose, I asked?”
“What did he say?”
“A lot. I’m almost done.”
“Is he in the hospital? Is he texting you from hospice?”
“Don’t know. I asked him, how long.”
“How long until he dies?” I laughed at my husband’s audacity. Scorpio moon. “You asked him how long he’s going to live.”
“Yeah, man. This is some biker dude. If I was dying, I’d want people to just talk to me normally.”
“Yeah, okay. So what he say? How long is he going to live?”
“He said, come on, man. Forever.”
“He said that?”
“Yeah. Damned Protestants. They’re all so confident.”
I laughed and shook my head. If he’s not worried, I’m not worried. And I thought of the non-religious. It seems it would be much harder to deal with something like this, if you don’t believe in God.
I think having faith could actually make it even harder if you don’t believe you deserve mercy and are dreading being punished.
Your husband’s instinct to just talk to the man the way he normally would strikes me as quite compassionate, he made it about two men having a conversation as equals. No healthy guy and sick guy dynamics. I would want to be treated that way.
My son has leukemia and we’re in hospital most of the time. The people I talk to are parents of kids with different kinds of cancer, two boys have already died. Faith, God, an afterlife, angels, heaven, Mary and Jesus are everyday realities. These children suffer and they’re innocent. Without faith how would you not go nuts? Death for me is real everyday but so is the belief in an afterlife. (I’m a big St John fan – writer of 4th gospel and Apocalypse, I don’t mean to sound morbid, I take the afterlife as seriously as is possible from an earth life perspective.)
I have alot of friends who’ve lost a child. If there is one thing I’ve learned it’s that this is something you get through, but you never get over it. There is a support group for people who’ve lost a child for any reason, any age. http://www.compassionatefriends.org
Yes, my son’s name is John ?
A coworkers grandmother died recently. She was a Christian I guess. My coworker was disturbed because her grandmother was terrified of dying towards the end. My coworker is also a Christian. I suggested that she might look at her own fear and doubts now. I guess the idea that you have to earn your way into heaven can be a little disconcerting, like Scottish said.
I guess being kind of a heathen I try not to think about what comes after this. I do try to tap into the infinite well of possibilities that we have right here, right now. I mean earth is heaven for some people and hell for others. I think the fact that I’ve explored my dark side has helped me with seeing through the illusion of fear. (Or started me on the path) and fear is the worst hell we can imagine. It’s worse than pain by far.
Well not all of them are confident but thats generally the way they come across, 🙂 especially to Catholics who (if they’re devout) have to go through procedure after procedure to save their souls, and even after that its still a big ‘maybe’; even if you do everything right, you’re most likely gonna end up in purgatory, which ain’t no heaven. You gotta work to get to heaven. I can see multiple reasons why most Catholics are conservatives- not just the abortion issue. 🙂
before my mother in law’s best friend passed away recently, she told me that she just hated to have to see people because they are always, “oh i’m so sorry for you, aw, ” and so many sad faces, feeling sad for her. Of course it’s sad but she told my mother in law that she was just tired of people feeling sorry for her (she is very religious) and said that she had made up her mind on euthanasia. it got to the point that she didn’t want anymore visitors. For her, she knew she was going to be allright after death.
According to a Hindu Epic : It is a miracle that people feel they are not going to die.