LIFE  AFTER  DEATH 

INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 8^th Monday in Ordinary Time  is, “Life After Death.”

At some point in everyone’s life, that becomes life’s question - Life’s # 1 Question.

We think about death - and life after death. It varies how the thoughts arise - perhaps first about others - like one’s parents or grandparents - then about ourselves.

Is this it? Is this all there is? Or is there life beyond this?

Last week, with the news stories about discovery of 7 new planets, in some other solar system, the talk  about the possibility of life in outer space - on other planets has reappeared.

But what about the lives of those who have died ahead of us. Are all the people who ever lived alive in some kind of inner space -  invisible space?  Is there a space, a place, called, "Heaven" or "Hell" or "Purgatory" or what? 

What is life?  What is the soul?  What is the life principle - that makes a corpse different than someone walking down the street?

So my homily is an effort to talk about these questions that we reflect upon from time to time.

Obviously people think and talk inwardly and sometimes outwardly about all this - more at 77 than 57 or 37 - and especially not when we were 17.

EVERY RELIGION - EVERY PHILOSOPHY

Every religion, every philosophy, faces this question about life eternal or what have you.

Every  - well not every - but every.... That’s what’s called a Semitic universal.

Everyone was at the party. Everyone? Well not everyone - but everyone. You know what I mean.

Well everyone thinks about, “Is this all there is?”

I just was at a burial and a service at Hillcrest Cemetery at 11 AM. Cemeteries have all those stones - with names and numbers on them in stone - but underneath is the decaying of a body.

Do cemeteries cause the most reflection - say like - more than the NICU section of a hospital?

TODAY’S FIRST READING

It was a comment in today’s first reading from Sirach that triggered these  thoughts - this topic - these questions.

“Who in the nether world can glorify the Most High in place of the living who offer their praise? Dwell no longer in the error of the ungodly, but offer your praise before death. No more can the dead give praise
than those who have never lived....”

Different commentators say that Sirach is saying that death is it. We know what we can do when alive - but when dead - we are either no more - or we’re in a nebulous nether world. 

Some use the Hebrew word “Sheol” - which becomes “Hades” - when translated into Greek - as the world for the nether world.

But every religion has some word or words to describe the next life - if they don’t say, “That’s it.”

THE REALITY OF DOUBTS

It’s interesting to state that those who believe in a life after death have doubts - and those who say, “That’s it!” have doubts as well.

In reading about Judaism on this topic - I kept on noticing that there is no consistency - no absolute statement - “This is what Jews believe when it comes to an afterlife.”

I can never forget the moment I was standing at my brother’s grave with his buddy - his best friend. We were praying. In fact Marty asked me if he could say the Kaddish Prayer out loud and I said, “Of course.” So he prayed in Hebrew or Aramaic. Afterwards he said to me, “I don’t believe in life after death.”

That killed me!

That triggered the reality of people standing there having two totally different beliefs.

A bunch of years later I’m sitting there in a room with Marty and his wife Gloria - and she is dying of cancer - and they were kidding and saying, “Wait till Pat and you are together looking down on us here and laughing at us.”

Gloria and me a short time before she died.

This stuff is the stuff of story and pathos and connections and people with people. I can still hear the sound of earth from my shovel falling down into Gloria’s grave one Sunday morning - surrounded by well over 100 people at her burial.

Death and cemetery moments trigger these questions as well.

CHRISTIANS

The gift of Christ is resurrection - the heart of Christianity.

St. Paul says if Christ did not rise from the dead, then we’re a bunch of fools - because that’s our central belief. [Cf. 1 Corinthians 15.]

IMPOSSIBLE

How is this possible?

Let’s say it’s impossible - then we trust in Jesus’ words from today’s gospel.

With God all is possible.

CONCLUSION

This is heavy stuff to think about on a Monday early afternoon.

Lent is almost upon us - Ash Wednesday is two days away.

Lent is a time of more serious thinking.

Lent ends with the death of Jesus on Good Friday and the Resurrection of Christ on Easter Sunday.

Amen.