Death be not proud; just be gone. It's time to live again

One of the books I read in junior high school, among the first "grown up" works of my then-nascent adventure with the written word, was John Gunther's "Death Be Not Proud."

 It was a book that touched my heart and soul, perhaps stirring the first deep questions I had about the meaning of life.

I had first, having always had a love for history, read Gunther's "Berlin Diary," a journal of his work as a foreign correspondent reporting on Germany during Hitler's rise to power and up until his expulsion as World War II erupted. (Note: Worth reading now, when fascism has found its soulmates on both the right and the left extremes; here's a link to the text: https://bit.ly/2L5I30o)

So, I picked up "Death Be Not Proud" next at my school's library.  It was a heart-breaking, heart-warming, intimate memoir of the ultimately fatal struggle of Gunther's teenage son, John, against brain cancer. (Here's a link to the book's movie adaption: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDJvJiDcouU

The book and movie take their titles from one of John Donne's so-called "Holy Sonnets," which in turn were inspired by Paul's words in 1 Corinthians 15:55: "O death, where is your sting? O Hades, where is your victory?"

Specifically, Gunther chose a passage from Donne's 10th poem in the series. (Click on the hyperlink to read the whole sonnet, and forgive the author's dated spellings . . . you'll figure it out. But in summary, the message is this:

Death be not proud, though some have callèd thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so . . .
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more, death, thou shalt die

 

I was about 14 when I first read those words, quoted in Gunther's book. Now, more than half a century later, I think of them again. Especially this year, 2019, Death has almost been a specter with some indescribable substance for my family. Both my parents gone and buried within three months of each other, and funeral reunions with a dwindling number of older relatives. 

 

So, where am I going with all this? Certainly, my blog this year has been rather somber at times, balanced, I hope, with the hope of faith. So, yes, you are probably as tired of death as I am. Too many goodbyes of late; time for more hellos.

I'm determined to say "hello" more often to Life, Love, and Light in my remaining years, however many or few they may be. I will pray, work out my salvation in actions driven by, I hope, deeper humility toward my God, and a decidedly more Christlike attitude toward others.

The Church Fathers and traditions of my Eastern Orthodox faith provide a rich narrative and examples on how to do the former. The latter will require openness, and suspending (better, eliminating) self-righteous judgment of my fellow humans in order to show them the Love I desire to shine from within.

I'll try to share that journey here. Stay tuned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memories and Eulogies: Snapshots of lives lived, and eternity gained

 This week, my mother's remains were buried with those of my father. It was the second trip to this gravesite in three months. 

 Now, they are together again here, and in the Light of Christ.

 This is what we believe, this faith, this hope.

 These are some select memories I shared as we said goodbye to her, on breezy, late summer day at my parents' shared, cliffside plot overlooking the Spokane River:

As we went from one little church pastorate to another, Mom seemed to attract hangers-on. Ancient old ladies, mostly, who would be a little less lonely with her regular visits. She’d bring some cake or cookies, and they would brew up some coffee. And they would chat for an hour or more.

There would be laughter, hugs and promises to come back again. Mom kept those promises, and she often took me along -- usually to the tiny home of one kindly, nearly blind and all-but-deaf widow of a German farmer.

It was boring, I would argue; the woman’s house always too hot, and then there were the smells. Let’s just say you might think she had a house-full of incontinent cats – though she had no pets other than two parakeets, with whom she held frequent conversations.

My own grandmothers had long since passed, so Mom made this lady my honorary “Grandma.” At first, it was just how Mom insisted I address her. “Grandma,” after all, had no family of her own, and she cared for me like a grandson . . . so, for crying out loud, I could reciprocate. And I did, with more conviction as the years went on.

It was one of Mom’s many lessons in compassion, taught in actions no one else might see, or if they did, understand in their depth.

...

But Mom had a different approach to how Christians were to handle bullies. Dad always told me to not hit back, just walk, or run away; turn the other cheek, or cheeks, as the case may be. But in a tiny central Washington farm town, Wilbur, other kids thought beating up the preacher’s kid was just great fun; they didn’t get this holy, bruised example of the Gospel, at all.

During one scramble home from school with three of these devils on my heels, I got tackled into my own garbage can. My tormenters scattered, but Mom heard the commotion. She cleaned me up, and then taught me how to make a fist.

 Don’t ever hit first, she said. But after that, well, a straight shot to the nose, or a punch to the stomach usually would end things. OK, I sniffled, and practiced making the fist. “Tighter,” she said, tucking my fingers into my palm. “And don’t let your thumb stick out like that. It could get broken.”

Then, Mom walked me over to where the three were hiding across the street. She told the boys I had been ordered not to fight back, but that was done. And, she invited them – one at a time – to fight me.

What? I gulped a stood there, looking as resolute as possible. But there were no takers that day. There were later that week on the school playground. And lo and behold, Mom was right – giving one of those surprised brats a bloody nose stopped the fight, as she predicted. There were a couple other fights, but before we left Wilbur to pastor another church, those kids were playmates and friends.

...

Flash forward. I was a young married man, just starting out on my journalism career. Mom would call me and invite me to coffee. We’d just talk, laugh; she’d ask questions, interested in what I was doing. And she’d give me advice on marriage – and some of it made me blush, to be honest.

She always knew when I was going through a rough patch, too. Out of the blue there would come a phone call, and she wouldn’t hang up without praying for me. But then, I knew she always prayed for me.

That stemmed from one last childhood memory. I was 8, and teasing my sister. Mom told me to stop it, and told me to put away my clothes. I didn’t want to. “OK, I’ll just pray for you then, Bobby,” she said.

I went to play with some toys, when, as if there was a loudspeaker inside my brain, I heard my name in a deep, and clearly disappointed voice. I ran to Mom, stammered an apology, and told her what had happened. She just smiled slightly, nodded, and hugged me.

That was my Mom. Earth was, and now Heaven is, a better place because of who God created her to be.

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A long, sweet goodbye: A prayer for the dead, a comfort for the grieving

Jesus, she fell asleep in hope as did Nature before the cold winter. 
Jesus, rouse her when the thorns of the earth are clothed in the light of eternity.

Those lines are from the Eastern Orthodox Christian "Akathist to Jesus Christ for a Loved One who has Fallen Asleep."  They are just a couple of many beautiful phrases and divine petitions contained within this ancient form of poetic prayer, one I have repeated daily for the past 40 days since my mother passed away.

And as a believer, those words are true as both art and statement of faith; so, to me, are the others spread throughout the Akathist's 2,400 words and 13 Kontakions (a thematic hymn form dating back to Byzantium and the 6th Century). Believe it or not, at "only" 13, it is on the short side among the many akathists preserved by the Ancient Church.

This was my second cycle of this Akathist this year. My father, Robert Sr., died at 96 years old; we buried him in late March. My mother, Katherine, 91, died in late June, a little more than three months after Dad passed, holding hands with her as they both slept at the Cheney Care Center, outside Spokane, Washington.

Their passings, however anticipated, have been bittersweet for me. Stroke-induced dementia in my Dad's case, and the final stages of Alzheimer's disease, in my Mom's situation, combined with the physical frailties of extreme old age to rob them of not just memory and then awareness, but left them in pain that only increasingly strong medications could ease.

I mourn them, and I celebrate their release -- and the emptiness within my heart wrestles daily with the relief I feel for the end to their sufferings, and the hope we shared as a family in Christ.

Now, having completed the Akathist for my Mom last night, it is the emptiness that has once more opened like a raw, bleeding wound. It's difficult to explain, unless you have prayed for your dead, but during those 40 days of reaching beyond this material world into the next, there was a . . . connection.

Call it a confirmation of another line from the Akathist: Jesus, union of love placed between those who have fallen asleep and those among the living.

For the past nearly seven weeks, I've had that connection. It has been both a time of souls embracing across the abyss, and a prolonged, inexplicably sweet goodbye.

Now, memories will have to do. For Mom, they will be bolstered in the telling, shared with family and friends on August 22, when her remains join those of my father, buried at Fairmont Memorial Park outside Spokane. Then we will hug each other, linger, and leave, our lives continuing . . . for a while.

Until, Mom and Dad, we meet again.
 

On awakening with a mountain lake, and a moose

 "I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery—air, mountains, trees, people. I thought, 'This is what it is to be happy.'"  —Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

 We rose well before dawn, having walked the dogs quickly in the darkness first, then packed up fly rods, tackle, and net in the car. A brief stop for coffee and a raspberry fritter to split, my wife and I drove East into the Wasatch Range and onto the narrow, winding mountain road up Big Cottonwood Canyon.

 We have arrived well before the crowds, at first all alone with the awakening day, the breeze off the water, the scent of pine and the tentative chirping and trilling of birds a peaceful welcome. A short time later,  we are joined by my son, Rob, and daughter in law Rachel. 

 It was twilight, with the coming sunrise a bashful, soft glow over the near two-mile high Brighton Ridge, we arrived at Silver Lake. The lake, which adjoins acres of marshlands, is a popular destination for young and old; the former can frolic in heavily forested picnic areas and run along the shoreline and scale adjacent mountain trails . . . and the latter, a mile of boardwalk meanders through the natural area where waterfowl, trout (of which we caught none, but that's fine) and, on this day, a foraging moose, too, resides.

 The moose, a cow, occasionally glances at us, but seems unperturbed; as it first swims and then plows through rushes and sedge meadows until it reaches the boardwalk. She clops onto the boardwalk and into the wet seeps beyond, intent on breakfast.

 I smile. How humbling, and beautiful, to just be part of the scenery for such a majestic creature.

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To close, a modern-day parable:

 Father Herman recalls a quiet moment when he was with Father Seraphim [Rose] and their animals came up to them: Svir [the monastery dog] looking up devotedly and wagging his tail, and a lovely, white-pawed cat named Kisa standing quietly by. 

 “From your point of view,” Father Herman asked in a reflective mood, “what are animals all about?”

Father Seraphim replied: “They have something to do with Paradise.”

Lord had mercy: The grandma I never knew, welcomed my mother 'home'

My grandmother, Bessie Fern Powell, held me when I was a baby.

I don't remember her. I was 2 years old when she died in October, 1955, at age 61 of cancer.

But I pray for her repose regularly, along with her husband, my grandfather Luther Powell, and my other grandparents, departed uncles and aunts and cousins, and a few folks, passed away and still living, who were sources of pain --and thus learning -- in my life.

So, all I have of Bessie is the memory of an old black-and-white snapshot my mother showed me. It was of my grandmother, who hailed from the Scots McGinnis family, holding me, wrapped in blanket.

That photo may be among the few belongings she left behind. I've not, yet, been able to bring myself to go through them.

Mom passed away on June 28, age 91, after years of being ravaged by Alzheimer's disease. I had seen her last in late March, when I buried by father. During our visits we had a few seconds of her being "present," a smile and a laugh, before the blank eyes and drifting off to sleep regained increasing, and terminal dominion.

Staff at her nursing home in Cheney, Wash., had told me her last few weeks were non-responsive ones. And finally, in the early morning hours a couple weeks ago, she just stopped. So, that was my image of her final breaths in this life, as I have prayed the Eastern Orthodox Christian Akathist for the Departed the past week or so.

But, back to Bessie.

Today I learned of another piece of the story of Katherine Mims' final moments, one that means so very, very much.

Late the day before she was found deceased, a staffer told my family, Mom awoke out of her near-coma briefly, shouting with surprised delight: "Mama!"

And then, she fell asleep again. As far as we know, she never awakened again, at least in this world.

Could it be? My heart tells me, yes.

Thanks, Grandma Bessie.

I look forward to someday seeing, and remembering you, for eternity.

The pain of grief, the joy of release: Until we meet again, Mom

 

I lost my 96-year-old father, the Rev. Robert Mims, in January. On Friday, my mother, Katherine, 91, joined him.

Dad left this world while holding her hand earlier this year at Cheney (Wash.) Care Center. Their separation was brief, their reunion eternal.

Like him, she passed away in her sleep, her internal organs having finally failed, long after Alzheimer's disease had robbed her of her memories, and her ability to speak or understand. But, until the last couple weeks when she lost consciousness and remained nonresponsive, this horrible disease had not taken her smile, or her spontaneous laughter.

Like Dad, her passing was a mercy, the end of her suffering a blessing.

As an Orthodox Christian, I am again beginning a 40-day period of the Akathist Prayer to Christ for the Departed, an ancient vigil for her soul and peaceful reunion with Dad, in the light and love of Our Lord.

I wonder how she feels about that.

A Pentecostal preacher's daughter and wife, she is now the subject of the prayers of the Theotokos, her guardian angel, and her son, amid votive candlelight and soft, gray clouds of incense.

I would imagine she is delighted, surprised and in wonder at how truly indescribable paradise is.

I see her in my father's arms, bathed in the love of God, discussing it all.

That makes me smile, amid the tears.

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Katherine Mims 1928-2019

Katherine Alberta (Powell) Mims, beloved mother, grandmother and great-grandmother, and wife of the late Rev. Robert Elliot Mims, passed away on June 28, 2019 of causes related to old age. She was 91.

Katherine, known for her open acceptance and love for all, especially those hurting from the sad vagaries of life, was a prayer warrior, unafraid witness for her Christian faith. Even as Alzheimer’s disease robbed her of memories, speech and physical health over the past few years, she always had a smile for visitors, especially children.

Katherine died at Cheney Care Center, where six months earlier she had held hands with her husband of 71 years, Robert, as he quietly passed. Their separation was blessedly brief, their reunion eternal.
Born Jan. 10, 1928 in Helena, MT, she was the daughter of the Rev. Luther and Bessie Powell, one of 14 children. Katherine is survived by one brother, John Powell (wife Kathleen), of Spokane, WA; one sister, Marlynn (husband Robert) Castor, of Lake Stevens, WA.; son Robert Mims Jr (wife Barbara), of Salt Lake City, UT; daughter Carolyn Mims, of Airway Heights, WA.;  two grandchildren, Robert A. Mims (Rachel), West Valley City, UT, and Brenda (Idal) Tchoundjo, Towson, MD; and great-grandchildren Joshua Mims, West Valley City, UT, and Lela, Gabriel and Nathan Tchoundjo, of Towson, MD.

Katherine, whose energetic gospel piano style was a perfect companion to Robert’s banjo, was also an equal partner in the more than 75 years of ministry they shared as a couple. Together, they worked first as evangelists, and then as a pastoral team with the Assemblies of God and Open Bible fellowships. Their last pastorate was non-denominational, at the Garden Springs Community Church in west Spokane, from where Robert retired from fulltime ministry in 1970.

Katherine worked for several years after that at Sacred Heart Medical Center’s switchboard, where her willingness to pray personally with co-workers and patients alike won her many admirers and friends.
A graveside memorial service is being planned for Aug. 22, 10:30 a.m., at Fairmont Memorial Park, 5200 W. Wellesley Ave., Spokane, WA.

The family requests that in lieu of flowers, contributions be made to either the Life Services Pregnancy Resource Center & Maternity Home (https://lifeservices.org) or The Alzheimer's Association (https://www.alz.org/nca/donate).