A man once bought himself a cemetery plot and a lawn chair, and then took a week of vacation to sit on the chair at his plot. I don’t think he sat there because the view was pleasant or because he was proud of his new property. He did it because he wanted to see his life from the point of view of his death and his death from the point of view of his life. Ignatian spiritual directors do something similar when they invite Christians to imagine thinking backward from their dying moment to a decision or choice that they’re about to make: If you were looking back from the end of your life, would that decision or choice be from God?
Mortality is a gift of God that helps us look to all our forebears in the faith as exemplars of discipleship; the moment of our dying prompts us to consider how often ethical decisions are made in faithfulness but without certitude. As we anticipate that final moment, we consider our deepest values, our surest beliefs and our ultimate hope. That hope leads us to live with integrity as far as we are able, and to finish our days with reliance upon God’s mercy for everything.
— Clay Oglesbee, Christian Century (September 20, 2011 edition), page 20
Very nicely put. I thank Kendall for this posting. I am packing to move to a new parish – I am 64 and I expect that this will be my last assignment. It is a strange feeling. A bit of me is still the shy, gawky youth who sallied out from high school and then university, rather naively expecting that life would hold better things. In God’s mercy it did. Memento mori along the lines of this quotation would have been helpful along the way if I had been mature enough to understand it. But still: with the help of grace it is never too late to grow spiritually.