Choosing Death

As I started to write this morning I was struck by the title of my last post - "savoring life" which is the opposite of what I have been thinking about this morning.  Suicide has been on my mind in the wake of two high profile suicides this week - Anthony Bourdain and Kate Spade.

I found myself thinking about the death of a young woman I knew forty years ago.  She was - like me - the mother of a toddler and we attended the same church.  Occasionally we got together for play dates for her daughter Anna and my Kacey.  I knew that she was separated from her husband and living with her mother.  Her husband was in Oregon and we were in New Jersey.

I was startled one Sunday to go to worship and learn that she had died.  The next day I found out that  two nights before she had taken a shower, put on a clean night gown and then used the rope from her daughter's swing to hang herself.  I remember calling our minister as I tried to make sense of it.  I began to learn a little bit about depression.  For months she had been "frozen" and recently had thought about trying to reconcile with her husband againt her mother's wishes. Perhaps her hopelessness was feeling trapped in wanting to leave and not being able to. But really, for me, depression is as much of a mystery now as it was then forty years ago.

I remember wondering if maybe I had checked in with her that week - would that have made a difference? Maybe for a moment it might have.  Again, depression is the mystery and we are left to carry on.  My role in her life was very peripheral and yet I remember it all very well.

Gloria Vanderbilt and Anderson Cooper wrote a book together The Rainbow Comes and Goes: A Mother and Son on Life, Love, and Loss.  in which they  they shared their correspondence with each other.  She has been through not only the death of her husband but being present for the suicide of her son.  Here is a quote from the book:

“Does one ever know what another person is really like, even someone very close to us? Do we know what we are like ourselves? What we are today may not be what we are tomorrow."

This book captured so well the essential mystery of being human and in relationship with others who we love deeply who may or may not realize or receive it. I have learned that suicides sometimes happen because there is a moment of despair and the person quickly decides to "just do it." Jump off a building or shoot themselves.  The only funeral I ever did for a suicide was for a 13 year old who waited until his mother left to get a bagel and shot himself.  The first sentence in my memorial address was a quote from The Road Less Traveled by Scott Peck:  “Life is difficult. This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths.

I read an article this morning written by a journalist remembering her father's suicide which happened 20 years ago.  She describes literally cleaning up the kitchen after he shot himself.  While depressed people may think their life is of no worth, the truth is that they leave a hole and a great big mess behind for their family and friends.  I've always said that suicide is taking your pain and throwing it into the world - almost like buckshot - landing in places and with people that you cannot imagine.  So today the Psychiatrists are on TV as people around the country and around the world wrestling with these public suicides that stir our memories and bring up pain that has been buried.

I reflect this morning and wonder what difference it makes that I am a follower of Jesus Christ.  Surely I know that "Life is hard, but God is Good."   I also know that being human - with or without faith - is a struggle for all people.  How do we sort through our times of failure and foolishness and loss and grief. And then there is the great mystery of our different genes, personalities, addictions. wiring.  so that the whole idea of "choice" - choosing life or death - is easier to talk about than to do.  Our labels and slogans like - "just say no" to a drug addict or "push yourself away from the table" to me are inadequate.

And then there is the great mystery of mental illness which forces us to acknowledge our limitations of understanding and controlling those that we love.  It is a mystery to me, anyway.

So, what difference does it make to be a follower of Jesus.  I think it is three things.  First, the awareness that God IS Love and that God is with us.  And nothing can separate us from the love of God.
" ⁸ For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, ³⁹ nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord."  

Nothing can separate us - not death or life - not even suicide.  Love wins no matter what.

Second,  the call that God puts on our heart to love each other.  And the awareness that what love looks like is often listening.  We are people who are hungry to be heard by another living human being and our listening can bring a connection that could save a life.  I believe that.

Finally it is about living consciously and  maing e a choose for life - which is to choose to do whatever we need to do to receive the love that God is offering.  For me, it is helpful to have a time of reflection, and to be part of communities that celebrate and express God's presence and to walk in nature and to do acts of service for others.  There   are lots of ways we choose life - just like there are lots of ways to choose death - like our numbing and destructive and negative paths.  We all have our own thing.

I am participating in a Retreat for Busy People for the next two weeks and here is a prayer that I received Wednesday written by Desmond Tutu and his daughter Mpho.  It is a wonderful expression of awareness of choosing life.

                                                        Don't Struggle and Strive so,.....

Don’t struggle and strive so, my child.
There is no race to complete, no point to prove, no obstacle course to conquer for
you to win my love.
I have already given it to you.
I loved you before creation drew its first breath.
I dreamed you as I molded Adam from the mud.
I saw you wet from the womb. I loved you then.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Stop racing ahead at your own pace; you will only be exhausted, flamed out and spent before the task is accomplished.
Pace yourself with me, walk alongside me.

Do you think I don’t know the demands of your life?
I see you striving for perfection, craving acceptance.
I see you bending yourself out of shape to conform to the image that you have of…
Do you imagine that I did not know who you were when I made you, when I knit you together in your mother’s womb?
Do you think I planted you as a fig tree and expected you to bloom roses?
No child, I sowed what I wanted to reap.

You are a child after my own heart.
Seek out your deepest joy and you will find me there.
Find that which makes you perfectly yourself and know that I am at the
heart of it.
Do what delights you and you will be working with me, walking with me,
finding your life in me.

My precious child, I will call you to account for nothing more than I have asked of you. Just be faithful to the task I have set before you.
Whether you succeed or not is no matter to me.
Live as you hear me speak in you.
Live in the truth you learn from me, then it won’t matter how the road may turn.
The goodness you live will set you free.

May you recognize in your life the presence,
power and light of your soul.

May you have respect for your individuality and difference.

May you realize that the shape of your soul is unique,
that you have a special destiny here.

May you not disrespect your mystery through brittle words of false belonging.

May the frames of your belonging be generous enough for your dreams.

May the expectation in others eyes never decide how you are to be.

May you be blessed with good friends and learn to be a good friend yourself.

May you have friends who can see you.

Take time to celebrate the quiet miracles that seek no attention.

Respond to the call of your gift and have courage to follow its path.

May your outer dignity mirror the inner dignity of your soul.

May anxiety never linger about you.

May you have the courage to speak for the excluded ones.

May you learn to see yourself
with the same delight,
pride
and expectation
with which God sees you in every moment.