9:30 p.m. - 2003-10-05
Attitude
Organized religion is to God, as a pointing finger is to the moon. So Buddhists believe. Your choice whether you focus your energies on the moon or the finger.
Number two son came by with P today. They had been at her Dad's funeral yesterday. My other sons were out at one of their Dad's family functions. Worked out well because what P wanted to talk about was dying, death, and eternity. I've worked with critically ill people and I've had my own near death experience(s). As a result of the latter, I've spent countless hours over the subsequent decades pondering those issues. Not in any morbid way, just trying to find the words and concepts that people can accept to explain my experiences, and thus my attitudes and beliefs about that which is beyond this material/physical life.
P described the last week of her Father's life in detail, needing to make sense of it. It was her responsibility to make the decision about when life support would be removed. She had a lot of questions about his medical condition and described the things she witnessed that puzzled her. Because our society is so isolated from the end of life, there are very few internal reference points for someone when a loved one dies. Her brother and his family managed to make the trip from Hong Kong before he died. Her Dad had already lapsed into a comatose state but revived for a while - he was especially happy to see his granddaughter. Unfinished business evolved into closure and he slipped away with his family around him.
The one thing that really upset P was that just near the end her Aunty - her Dad's twin sister - and her family arrived with their preacher in tow. Fundamentalist Christians insisting that they baptize a man who had lived his whole life in a Buddhist/Taoist frame of reference. They branded him a sinner, not for the life he led or the man he was, but because he hadn't acceded to their world view. They threatened P's Mom with a picture of her husband burning in Hell, if the ritual wasn't carried out and if their preacher didn't officiate at the burial.
P said the preacher never even got her Father's name right during the funeral. He lied about her Father admitting at the door of death that his failure to become a Christian had imperiled his mortal soul. P was present and said that the conversation repeated is what the preacher said at her Father's bedside - not what her Dad had said. I witnessed similar behaviour and tactics on a regular basis when I worked in the hospital. Reducing deity to a petty, vindictive human, using that image to intimidate and bully grieving loved ones at their most vulnerable into compliance, isn't anything to do with the divine. It is an emotional assault and it is abuse. Even I had one idiot like that force his way into my room after I had just gone through a very difficult labour and delivery. I recall being overwhelmed with his threats of my future of abuse from his own personal god. He was refusing to leave, appealing to my parents to force me to join his church. He asked my father how he had chosen the church he attended when he was a young adult. My Dad said he loved basketball, so he joined the one with the biggest gym and best team. That was the end of the conversation as we were all consigned to hades.
Predators and bullies come in all shapes and guises. That was one of my earliest lessons in using humour to remove the venom such abusive behaviour can leave to fester in one's system. Maybe if mainstream church leaders looked in their own mirrors once in a while, they'd understand why people are staying away in droves, while both newer and more ancient spiritual practices are attracting those same people. There is a profound well of faith and a great need for spiritual nourishment in our countries, but there is little true substance offered in most traditional churches anymore. End of rant. I suggested to my daughter-in-law that when she was ready, there would be nothing wrong with her organizing her own celebration of her Father's life, inviting those people who loved him as he was as much as she did. She seemed to take comfort in that idea.
I watched "Save the Last Dance for Me" as a de-stressor later on. All cultures have their own way of showing attitude, of saying that what and who they are is valuable in and of itself. It was good to see an affirmation of that so soon after the talk with P and my son. I had talked about my near death experience when I was nineteen and the fact that my Mom's Mom (deceased two years earlier)was waiting "on the other side of the river" of light with a piper - bagpipes that is - to honour the traditional Scottish practice of piping someone across the water when they arrive in a new country or setting. I've mentioned before that the sword dance is one way the Gaels show attitude to their detractors. Scots_Wha_Hae_Wi_Wallace_Bled "I'm alright just as the almighty made me, work your own clay."
�
�
