Death is not a purely individual act,
any more than life is. Like every great
milestone in life, death is celebrated
by a ceremony that is always more or
less solemn and whose purpose is to
express the individual's solidarity with
his family and community.
The three most important moments of this
ceremony are the dying man's acceptance
of his active role, the scene of the
farewells, and the scene of mourning.
The rites in the bedroom or those of the
oldest liturgy express the conviction
the life a man is not an individual
destiny but a link in an unbroken chain,
the biological continuation of a family
or a line that begins with Adam and
includes the whole human race. (Aries,
603)
Personal responses to one's own or
another's death provide an intimate look
into one's deeply held belief system.
While it is relatively easy to maintain
a non-traditional view of death and
dying when not faced with the actuality
of death, how one reacts when death
touches oneself or a beloved friend or
family member is a better measure of
beliefs. Although few of our Internet
correspondents had an occasion to
participate in such an event (several
mentioned they had not yet had a
significant person in their life die)
one example was provided. How this
correspondent choose to participate in
the death of a friend provides an
example of how the beliefs reviewed
above can provide help in the dying
process.
A second example shows how a mother
using these beliefs devised a ritual to
help her mourn her miscarried child.
After reviewing these two very private
responses to death and dying we will end
this section by exploring the obituaries
published in Circle Network News for a
view of the public face of grieving.
Kubler-Ross talks about the stages of
dying. As the patient resolves the
various issues involved in his condition
he begins to occupy himself with his
future transition. (Ross, 87-88) She
provides examples of the techniques she
and her students used to help the dying
through these various stages. The only
ritual for the dying posted to the
Internet was for friend dying of AIDS.
Before he had been diagnosed he had
asked our correspondent to be his
"teacher and priestess." (onca,
10/15/93) Almost a year later he asked
her "as his priestess" (onca, 10/15/93)
to "help him die." Rather than taking
that request literally she began to use
meditation to try to help ease his pain.
During one of these sessions she decided
to lead him through a series of guided
meditations designed to "introduce him
to the 'other side' and give him the
opportunity to say good bye to his loved
ones." (onca, 10/15/93) In the first
meditation they visualized a "beautiful
cave with many crystals, each exuding
light of its own color." At the far end
of the cave was a gate. Beyond the gate
waited many other people as well as
feelings of love and the complete
absence of pain. The dying friend was
told he could go through the gate if he
wanted to. The second meditation took
place on a mountain with "winds and
fresh air, [t]he smells and feeling was
of freedom." Again at the top of the
mountain was a large gate slightly ajar.
The dying friend was told there was
nothing but love on the other side of
the gate. The final meditation was in a
quiet, peaceful, beautiful forest.
Walking along the path through the
forest the friend met various people
"still on this side." He had the
opportunity to say what he needed to say
to each one. "[S]ome were 'I'm sorry',
some were 'I forgive you', all were
ended with 'Good-bye.'" When he had said
good-bye to everyone they again came to
a gate. The guide could go no further
but she told him "we would always love
him; but that the love he felt from the
other side of the gate was much greater
than the love he had ever felt on this
side. It was perfect love, without
judgment. That there was nothing he
could feel from that side of the gate
that made him fearful. He may feel
sadness that he had to leave the people
on this side, but that the love on the
other side overwhelmed that feeling of
sadness." Before this meditation the
patient was in constant pain. (orca,
10/15/93) That night he was reported to
have spent the most pain- free night of
his two-month stay in the nursing home.
The next day he woke up proclaiming that
he felt "wonderful." After going into a
seizure he fell into a deep coma and
died about 24 hours later. "I have no
doubt that it was in part my aid that
helped him to cross over to the other
side. He was terrified of dying before
then." Rather than using Kubler-Ross'
psychologically-based talking therapies,
the guide used a common meditative
technique to share her view of death
with her friend, allow him to complete
his unfinished good-byes and prepare
himself for that final transition.
Having a set of shared beliefs as well
as a powerful technique for
communicating with the subconscious gave
the teacher a way to communicate with
the student in a unique and powerful
way. We can see in the meditative
descriptions of the transition the
research of Raymond Moody, author of
Life After Life, concerning near-death
experiences. In this ritual little is
said about an afterlife except that it
was characterized by perfect love,
without judgment and the absence of
pain. The belief in some type of
continued existence is postulated by the
presence of others on the other side of
the gate but the nature of their
existence is left open (or perhaps
assumed, based on information not
provided in the correspondence). The
opportunity to communicate with the
living, saying good-bye, forgiving some
and asking forgiveness for others
provided in the hospital-like
institution some of the elements of
Aries' "tame death" and the
correspondent believed reduced the dying
man's fear of that final transition.
One of the most painful experiences in
the life of any parent is the loss of a
child. This may be particularly painful
in the event of a miscarriage or still
birth when the unborn child may not be
accepted by the surrounding community as
a "real" person and parents are not
accorded all the grief and mourning
rituals normally associated with death.
The following ritual is included in this
paper because I feel it not only
highlights the view many Pagans have
toward life, death and rebirth it also
provide an example of how one mother
used her Pagan beliefs to deal with her
own pain. Since it was published in a
widely-read Pagan periodical it is
explicitly shared by the author with the
wider community as an example of how
they might also deal with a similar
situation. According to the introduction
to this short ritual it was written by
the mother after she suffered a
miscarriage.
