"Death not as a distant darkness that his great faith was light enough to see him through; death not as a universal condition; but death as this death and darkness which he saw written across the swollen faces of the two women who stood there before him."(F. Buechner "Listening to Your Life" p. 270)
As a priest I have certainly had my experiences with death and grieving. I've been with families at bedsides as a loved one dies, or as the machinery that is keeping them alive is taken off. I've presided over plenty of funerals where even though the deceased had lived a long and happy life, the grief was still real. The first few years were hard to get through those funerals. I'd still feel tears welling up. This doesn't happen as much anymore, but I also haven't experienced death on a deeply personal level in quite some time.
I'm sure that I will have to deal with it much more deeply again at some point. My hunch is that I will at that point weep, just as Jesus did. I hope that there will be for me at that point, someone or many people there to uphold me, so that I can grieve. While my faith may be my consolation over the long haul, it is others who will weep with me and give me the time and space to do so myself that ultimately will see me through.
All of us will have that moment, and many have already gone through it. And I'm sure that many of those same people have been able to be present for others at that moment, because they have a general understanding of what life feels like at that moment.
Blessings,
Ed
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