Spinal Thoughts VIII – The Least Rights – Shirley Gets Set to Meet Her (not My) Maker

It’s getting dark. All systems go. Shots administered, dinner over and smelly leftovers removed. All is at peace. Quiet at last.

Until the family returns. Shirley has been rejoined by her clan, who pile into her room like lemmings jumping over a cliff. They station themselves around her, and someone announces “This is Father Joe.”

This wakes me up. Alert, what is going on now over there? Soon it becomes evident that F.J. the man in the black dress, is prepping for an operation not of this earth. I hear the intonations of casting a spell to make Shirley more presentable to her Maker. I hear the amens and the Latin supplications.

Apparently, Shirley is in pretty bad shape.Notwithstanding her son leaning over into my half of the room and advising me that he had had these prayers said over him over 40 years ago and look, he is still here. I guess he saw the panic in my eyes.

If Shirley got these last rites, or extreme unction, or as I would call it – family paranoia that the Devil hisself is a’ comin’ to claim her soul tonight, she must be pretty darn near Death’s door. In fact, I can smell and sense Death lurking just outside my fifth floor window, beyond the lovely scenery of the park and mansions across the river. This is not good. I can’t very well avoid the sound and aura of the man in black mumbling away stuff that should have been left in the ancient texts from whence it came.

As a good ex-Catholic girl, there is a limit to my annoyance. Let her have her sad, morbid joke at my expense. The family seems oblivious that there is a person not 10 feet away, who is under the influence of  no less than that many agents, who is getting the wrong impression.

Research reveals that extreme unction, while good for the purposes of the dying, is actually just a precaution. It will heal the soul, erase the sins that are accumulated there, to make the soul acceptable for entrance into Heaven. But this is all psycho-bullshit to me, and I’m scared silly that Shirley’s ghost will thrust aside that curtain once the family exits to go to their dinner, and castigate me for not enjoying her sacramental hiatus.

A few therapeutic hours, time passed, a new day beginning, and Shirley and her family are still there. What exciting sacrament or ritualistic paranoia will come up now that Shirley has survived her ticket to Heaven? Only time and several more shots of morphine will tell.

 

An Encounter with The Speakin’ Deacon

Kevin died. Kevin was the father of a good friend and neighbor of mine, enough said. So to support the family, we went to the wake with other neighbors and friends. There were some lovely paintings about the room; I guess he was an artist of sorts. Otherwise, having never met the man, there was very little to tell about his life.

Until you met the speakin’ deacon. If you check my previous blogs, you will notice that I am totally freaked out when someone gets up there and describes their version of religion. I am also convinced that speakers at services are under some sort of mandate (or hypnotized) to begin a rant as soon as possible not about the deceased’s life and loves, but about “how the deceased brought Jesus into my life in the past two weeks.” huh?

I came away with this knowledge:

1. Upon death, you are closer to God than you can ever be, in your life.

2. Upon death, you are given all the knoweldge you ever wanted. You know the answer to everything.

3. The deceased now is an intercessory to Jesus or God, I forgot which.

There were other theologic facts stated, but I thought these three were the best ones. They alone merit a straightjacket.

My thoughts:

1. Okay, then. the earth has no reference whatsoever to the divine. I need to know that next time I am awed by the beauty of the sky, the stars, life itself. It is not sacred. It is not blessed.

2. Maybe now I’ll know the answers to all those third grade math questions that got me kicked out of the advanced classes and into the “2″ class where I learned music instead of Latin.

3. Not sure about this. I think it refers to how I was taught as a kid to use the different saints for different things. As an adult, naturally I use different goddesses for different things. After all, the goddesses are aspects of the ONE. But the saints are people who got elected by us after they were dead. It’s all so confusing.

All in all, this Catholic services wasn’t half as offensive as the straight-out Christian one where the speaker was almost rolling his eyes up in his head. This deacon was nice and mild. He raised his hand when he wanted us to chant back. I liked the Catholic service better.

March 16 Small Discussion Group

Here is the discussion of 3/16. It was attended by only two of our four CoA-ers, and two of us mentors. But we covered a lot of ground.

We went around the group and shared an experience we’ve had explaining our religion and/or spiritual beliefs to another person.

• Did I tell them I am UU?
  • I have told people I am UU, and stress that it represents “God is Everywhere, God is Love.” Then I have to explain that I only use the term “God” as an easy way for someone else to relate.
• Did I talk about my beliefs regarding God. an afterlife, fate, or good and evil?
  • Sure. People talk about that all the time, if they are close enough. But I don’t push the issue.
• How did the person/people respond?
  • Because I seem to be a reasonably sane person, at least sometimes, people take me as I am. This is because adults usually just shake their heads, and can walk away.
• Did I feel prepared?
  • Of course!
• Was I proud of my religious convictions?
  • Totally, absolutely, very.
• Was there anything I wish had been different about the conversation?
  • I wish that people would be more open-minded and willing to “try” my congregation. There is nothing threatening about an all-encompassing, loving group of people joined together to work for social and religious justice and peace.

Here is how I would present my faith to someone in a tiny short time:

• What parts of this religion are most important to me?
  • Our 7 principles and the sources of our tradition.
• Which aspects of my spiritual beliefs do I think do I think a person will have the toughest time understanding and the easiest time understanding?
  • Toughest call is the ability to hold many positions, not a single one. Easiest is that at least I acknowledge some kind of other out there. Or do I?
• What do I like best about participating in this community, and how do I talk about that to someone who isn’t a part of it?
  • I love the camaraderie between services, being able to walk over to almost any one and start a meaningful conversation. I love having a minister who is friendly and talkative and who is willing to listen. I talk to people about it with a sense of awe that I found this place.
    
• If I wanted to convince this person to consider UU (or just my church) for themselves, what would I say?
  • I would point out that there is a place where anyone can be free to follow their own truth.
• If I only had 30 seconds to describe UU, what would I say?
  • We are a faith that accepts the universal truth that there is something above us, that runs through all our endeavors, and that is love. It comes from the Earth, our Mother and permeates all we are and can be.
    

Going where in a Handbasket!

I’m sad. My sister’s partner, Richard, passed late last week. He had been ill, but somehow the actual event was hard to deal with. He loved life and he loved my sister with a vengeance. There was very little you could say about this guy except, wow! When he was there, you knew it.So, we had a lovely funeral up where he lives in PA.

Some of the things I now know about this guy are that he was the consummate fisherman. He knew his Delaware River, he knew surf fishing on Sandy Hook and he loved his sport. He was also a hunter, but I don’t want to really think about that.

I also learned to my dismay, that he has a brother-in-law who is a preacher. A reverend, a pastor. A complete maniac. Here is what happened -After the wake and all the people came in, and there were lots there, believe me, we all quieted down and this pastor guy came up to the podium, hefting a well-worn bible and started in to talking.

First, he generalized about the life of Richard, which was very nice. Then, he suddenly went off after reading a couple of passages from scripture and a prayer, which was okay because it is king of tolerated at a funeral of a Christian guy. But he suddenly like, snapped, and instead of talking about Richard any mor

e, he introduced his agenda with a phrase something like “let’s try to find what the life of Richard can tell us about Jesus Christ.”Huh? I thought he was going to talk about poor Richard and that was that but, noooooo…

It went something like this – he started saying that Richard was like the guy in Hades (???) who wanted to say something to people he left behind about all he knows now. So he said why not Richard up in heaven wanting to tell us about what he know. Huh? Then the preacher feller said that God felt I guess on a personal level, that we were all sinners

here on earth. Guess why? Well, Adam and Eve! That’s where I started rolling my eyes. This guy had to be kidding. How can he stand there and seriously recall that the earth was without sin until little old Eve went and Did IT!!! And there he went off with the rant that God still loved us, even though we were now conceived in damnation and would not amount to a hill of beans here on the planet. So he (God, I mean) sent down Jesus to fix that.Oh, my. What a tirade we were subjected to. Basically it’s the usual Right-wing Christian thing that well, there was this earth that God of

course created in like 7 days. Then God made up the first people, Good o’l Adam and his girl Eve. Eve did some bad stuff and ate an apple at the behest of a snake. Okay are you following this so far? Of course every culture has to have its creation myth and I guess we’re stuck with this one. Anyway, God then turns A & E out of this perfect sinless place and they beget the whole friggin human race but the whole thing is messed up. Because of this big sin thing, everyone is worried about going off to Hell when they die. So God sends Jesus along to save us from ourselves.Poor Jesus. I can’t figure out how a normal person can believe in this virgin birth stuff. As a pagan, of course I feel it’s a nice story, but just represents som

e aspect of nature which, by the way, is not evil and full of sin. But it sounds like even the cows and the elephants were subject to this Hell stuff. More on that at the end.Jesus gets killed. No. He “allowed” himself to be killed. Okay again. We got washed in his blood. (This is kind of Catholic; something a priest would say. Not too offensive but disgusting.) Now we are eligible in the eyes (???) of God to get to go into Heaven. Wow.

It was just that he was looking me in the eye and stating that I had no business thinking that my life on earth was worth shit if I didn’t drop everything and agree with his nonsense. In fact, if I imagined him in a straight-jacket, it put everything into perspective.

After he almost gave me a heart attack because of his nasty accusatory attitude, I wanted to go up and give a public pagan blessing to Richard. I had nothing prepared of course, and I let it go. But when we finally filed past the mourning family and my sister and I turned to say bye to Richard, I bid him blessed be and made my pentacle in the air going widdershins, as this is the end of my earthly plane relationship with him. It was relieving, except that I could feel this nasty preacher watching this. I just wanted to get away from those crazy people and we jumped in the car and left.I hope I never see this maniac any more. Actually I was left confused. I needed clarification. First, where is Hades mentioned in the Bible? Second, when he was talking about Richard getting through the pearly gates, the preacher guy of course thinks that Richard will be fishing there. Now here’s the question: Are these fish he is now killing to eat, are they special dead fish that are in their own fish hell, or fake fish that don’t die, or angel fish at all?

I gotta go jump in a pond now.

Small Group Discussion Thoughts

People often have many feelings, sometimes conflicting, when a loved one or acquaintance dies, what did you feel?

There is sadness, but a feeling for me, that somehow, it’s not over. I seek ways to remember the person, to keep their memory alive, as I would all the ancestors.

What thoughts or ideas about death comforted you at the time of that person’s death?

I never considered this thought, but I keep the memory alive and hope that my memory will live on somehow. I think of them in peace and love.

What did that person believe about death? Did he or she believe in an afterlife? Do you?

I don’t think my Uncle Jim and my Grandma thought much past what their faith, Roman Catholicism told them. That is, there would be a heavenly reward awaiting them. But what sense does that make when you are a non-practicing Catholic like Uncle, who had the audacity to marry a Jewish woman and was thereby ostracized anyway, or Grandma, who left this world in a state of mental and physical incapacitation, unaware of what was happening, at least to the observer.

How did this person’s death change your life? How did it change your ideas about death and what death means?

Both events made me want to make preparations, leave something meaningful. I also feel that we should leave the world better or at least the same as we found it. But that’s just me. These deaths did not change anything for me.

In what ways do our UU values help us when someone dies? Do the seven principles (for example) address death and what happens when we die?

I don’t find any clear advice about this, except that we are a part of the web of all creation, and as such, return to it or morph into another way of being a part of that.

After thinking about death and remembering the death of someone you knew, what gives you hope?

I want to be remembered, and I want to remember all those who went before.