WHAT FALLS AWAY IS ALWAYS

Today is St. Patrick’s Day, and I have green, proud green on my chest and heart, and green, sorrowing green in my heart.  The sorrow in me is for the death of a dear friend, a sorrow that has barely begun to bloom.  It is like the stems of the bushes and the limbs of the trees here in Minnesota, who were stirred by the early spring come after winter, but have not risen, have not blossomed.

Mark and I were in every class together our freshman year at Austin Pacelli High School (Go Shamrocks!): Latin, English, Biology, Algebra I, Civics, Religion, Phy Ed.  I think I got them all.  Even into our early sixties, we would quote to each other the rousing dictum: Agricolae portam frumentam per silvam ad equis in agris. Words to laugh about, to toast with.  We stayed close though we went to different colleges; we were “young urban professionals” in Minneapolis before there was such a term, doing jobs we knew we wouldn’t do for long—he driving a school bus, me serving as a home health care aide.  We were a part of each other’s weddings, and in fact, I caught the garter of his wife that he threw at his wedding, and gave it back to his wife Debbie at mine.  He became a lawyer, I a pastor, but continued to share our love for politics, poetry, sports and above all family.

Mark stayed in Minneapolis and built a career as an honest, caring, dedicated lawyer. I lived on the East Coast for almost 23 years, but we stayed in touch.  Many friends call each other on their birthdays, or Christmas or New Years or another holiday.  We called each other every election night, as much to commiserate as to celebrate, and always ending in laughter and wishes for each other and our families. He was a partner in the firm that Walter Mondale is a part of.  The senior senator from Minnesota, Amy Klobuchar and him shared a secretary for awhile.

I write all these words, and smile, and feel empty.  I want to bring Mark back, talk with him, go to the Twins home opener and drink a beer.  I want to touch his hand, and salute him.

This time of Lent is a time to reflect on our mortality, as we reflect on God’s.  I am called as a pastor to talk about death often—as death approaches, at the moment of death, at the funeral, in the long, lonely painful times after.  I do so joyfully, knowing my own doubts about what death is, and what comes “after”, when there is no after, no before, no time, but just is.

As I age, I have found that I can less and less explain death and the promise of resurrection my faith leads me to.  There is less and less certainty, and more and more hope.  I’m OK with that this St. Patrick’s Day, but it hurts.  The thing about St. Patrick that most draws me is his desire and his decision to go back to Ireland—the land of his enslavement—and serve the people who had mistreated him, even willing to face death.

Mark died the same day as a long-term parishioner, Josephine. My wife Luisa and I were privileged to be her pastors for almost ten years, and privileged to be with her the morning of her death.  The morning I was singing to myself the old hymn “Softly and Tenderly Jesus Is Calling” because we were going to sing it the next Sunday.  When we went to Jo’s room at the care center, her one surviving sister, Ruth was there.  Jo was “there” in the sense of her body and her labored breathing, but her eyes showed no recognition.  I had brought the old hymnbook to sing and asked Ruth if Jo had any favorite hymns. Ruth said Jo’s favorite was “Softly and Tenderly”, and so I sang that to Jo, as Luisa knelt by her bed and softly and tenderly stroked her head.  It was a holy moment, and I am grateful for it.

I am not grateful for death.  When my father was dying of lung cancer, we prayed for the ending of his suffering but I did not pray for his death.  Mark and Jo were suffering, but I do not rejoice in their death, though it brought an end to their suffering.  I am with Dylan Thomas on that one:

Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

But I am also with Theodore Roethke, in one of my favorite poems, “The Waking”—a poem that started me writing poetry:

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.

Mark would have loved that poem, I think.  And does, somehow, in some way, still.

Though he is still. And is no more.

The bonds of love that hold us together in life are not broken in death, but oh they are surely tested and tried.  I want to hold onto each cord of each person I treasure tonight, but I know that I do not have the strength—do I even have the will?—to do so.  But I hear around me the call to let go: let go of Mark, let go of Josephine, let go of my desires and my plans, let go even of my life.  But these hands, these hands of mine…

 

Trust, hands, that what falls away is always and is near.

 

Be beauty. Be justice.  Be sorrowing green.

Patrick