(I expect this topic to be very life affirming, but just in case, if you are experiencing suicidal impulses, please call the national suicide prevention lifeline at 1-800-273-8255)
The goal of life is to die, one day at a time.
The purpose of life is to live forever.
I’ll break this down in a second. First, let’s talk about the undead.
We’re attracted to the undead. Whether it is an immortal singing skeleton king in an unchanging town, or a stylish vampire living in a remote castle, we love them, and often want to join them. I think there are two reasons for this, one healthy and one it's unhealthy muddling.
The unhealthy reason is that they do what they please. They have power and no obligations. On top of this they are often also wealthy (1% compound interest isn’t that bad when you have centuries) and/or attractive. They are at license to do anything, from indulge their darker sexual impulses to stay up way past their bedtimes.
Jack Skellington takes as many Milky Way fun size bars as he damn well pleases, thank you very much
(painting by Thomas Volpe)
The healthy reason is that they are fully themselves. They are eternal, like we will be in heaven. They have their niche in their little kingdom of night, like we will one day have our unique place in the Kingdom of Heaven. Their power extends from a natural reflection of their innate nature, like our own power extends from our honed gifts and talents. In some ways, they are more fully human than we are.
Not to mention badass. PS: I hate this show's portrayal of the Catholic Church, but I can't pretend it doesn't make us look cool.
There is a Christian devotion called “Memento Mori” or “Remember Death.” It means keeping a reminder of death nearby, such as a literal human skull. It has seen a comeback in recent years (this time with plastic skulls) thanks to the work of Sr. Theresa Aletheia Noble. (Like many of the ideas discussed in this blog, I am extrapolating from a tangential familiarity without doing extensive research. I have not read Sister’s books yet, and if I get something wrong please feel free to correct in the comments below). Remembering death, though, has more than one meaning.
1) The most obvious meaning, of course, is that our bodies will die one day. No person of reason (other than some very persistent rich people in Silicon Valley) disputes this point. Whether we are kleptocrat or clinician, president or priest, beggar or busboy, a cascade of various organ failures will one day put us in the ground. We all have that in common. We do well then not to take ourselves too seriously. The end in this realm of existence is always the same.
2) For a Christian though, this has an added meaning. While we must not take ourselves too seriously, we must take what we *do* more seriously in light of death. One day, we will stand before God, and must give an account of what we have done with the gifts given to us. What fruit have they born? And the fruit we tend to care about won’t necessarily be the fruit God cares about; (see Leaf by Niggle).
3) The meaning of Memento Mori which I most need (right now) is to remember that we have died to sin. Every burden, every single piece of misery in our life which is self-caused (whether we are willing to admit it or not), we have the power to put down through the death of God. It doesn’t matter whether I am a fighting the temptation to murder (usually not) or I just would like to stop clicking “next episode” on Netflix (quite frequent). God gives us the power to put it down.
Note I do not say God gives us the power to fight those things which keep us enslaved. We will ALWAYS lose the battle against them. Sin is stronger than us. Rather the power of Christ’s death and resurrection is that we can give our lives to him, and then He can break our chains (thus giving us our lives back). Trying to break the chains ourselves, and only then turning to Christ, will end in failure. This is what we always try to do (this is what I always try to do) and we have it backwards. Part of this is a desire not to face Christ until we are perfect, and part of it is a desire to keep our lives essentially for ourselves. Neither can be done. This is what Christ means when he says “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 16:25). If we try to structure God around our life, we will die. If we structure our life around God, we will live.
The Servant by Ron DiCianni
This is why every 12 step program in existence never mentions the thing that a member of that program is struggling with after the 1st step. Their battle is not with alcohol/media/drugs/lust/debt etc. God does battle with those things for them. This does not mean they are passively waiting for God to fix them. Instead they take on another battle: the battle to put their life in God’s hands. That is, they strive to die, one day at a time.
4) The purpose of life is to live forever with God. This is made possible by another “Memento Mori.” We remember Christ’s death, the source of our hope. We have hope in eternal life because we have faith in Christ’s death and resurrection. Christ overcame death, and so shall we who bind ourselves to him. “For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3)
A corollary of the above was only brought to my attention recently, by Bishop Robert Barron’s Word on Fire podcast: remember you have died already. As Christians, if we have died with Christ, death should not frighten us. After all, we’ve had daily practice in it.
Perhaps this is the freedom, though distorted, that we see and love in the undead of Halloween. They’ve already faced the thing we fear most and come out of it better. Perhaps not better as a Christian understands it, but metaphorically more themselves. May the same be said of us.
A very happy allhallowtide to you all. Thank you for reading!
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