In the last few days I’ve heard of the deaths of three people. The first one was a friend-of-a-friend, the second was someone I knew slightly in years gone by and the third – the third was someone I knew quite well. It’s getting closer: death, which so far has hovered in the distance, approaching only to take the elderly or the very sick; death, which so far has given warning of its intentions and only struck after a long illness or prolonged old age; death now grows bold and stalks us all, striking without warning. It’s like a wild animal which so far has only terrorised the outskirts of the city but now comes into the suburbs and threatens the very hub. The Pope said yesterday – or it may not have been the Pope, I can’t remember – that only a fool would fail to think about their own mortality in these times. No it wasn’t the Pope – he said something else – it was Richard Rohr, whose daily readings hit my inbox first thing in the morning. I can’t find the quote but he does have a lot to say about coming to terms with death.
The death of someone known affects us all. I hadn’t been close to Sonja at all yet I felt shaken by the news, and I’ve ‘seen’ her several times on my daily walks; the brain lights up with recognition and you think, Ah, there’s Sonja before realising that it definitely isn’t. I’ve had this experience with everyone I’ve known after their death and I still sometimes see my Dad walking down the road.
The Pope said something very wise and in a way surprising; that C19 may be a plague on humanity because of our desecration of the planet. I tend to agree; if it’s a punishment for anything it’s that, though I prefer to think of it as giving the planet a rest from us and giving us a chance to change. Will we change before it’s too late? I hope so but I fear it may take a lot more than one corona virus. Sometimes I just wish we’d all die out…
Still, there’s one good thing: death was until recently the great taboo. Now we’re all talking about it…
Kirk out
Sarada Gray 