dying – Feminism and Religion

Shame and the Caregiving Relationship by Stephanie Arel

I was asked recently to present my work on shame and guilt for a documentary about the experience of being in a caregiving relationship. Initially, I felt concerned. My conceptualization of the idea of caregiving circulated around 1) aspects of parenthood and 2) the inevitable life situation of witnessing a parent’s death. I have no experience with either of these. I expressed my concern to the producer and one of the cameramen as we discussed the protocol for the shoot. They suggested I try to tell stories. This perplexed me a little further. Then, in order to offer me a context, they posed questions about times I might have cared for people in the past. Their inquiry uncovered a large range of possible, personal caregiving experiences upon which I could draw. For me, these include experiences involving my in-laws, my aunt’s dying of cancer when I was a child, and, most currently, my tending to a friend who had a massive stroke at the brain stem at the age of 40.

What struck me most during the conversation was the way that I eschewed being called a “caregiver.” The cameraman noted that this was not an unusual phenomenon. Apparently, people consider the word “caregiver” somehow stigmatizing and resist its use. AARP has tried to come up with an alternative term but has not been successful. (As an aside, AARP’s website has useful resources for the caregiver.) The stigma undulating beneath the undertaking of caregiving aligns it with the experience of shame. Continue reading “Shame and the Caregiving Relationship by Stephanie Arel”

Old and Gay – Dying Alone and Rae’s Friends by Marie Cartier

A dear friend of mine is dying. Yes, the saying might be true—we all die alone. But we all are not necessarily lonely when we die. How can we die happy…with our self-respect intact?

We are all alone, born alone, die alone …I do not say lonely — at least, not all the time — but essentially, and finally, alone. This is what makes your self-respect so important, and I don’t see how you can respect yourself if you must look in the hearts and minds of others for your happiness. —Hunter S. Thompson

Many of the women that I interviewed in my book Baby, You Are my Religion: Women, Gay Bars, and Theology Before Stonewall lived a closeted gay life. Their respect for their gay self had to be hidden in order to survive. It was how they respected the gay inner self—it is how they protected that self’s very survival.

Many of them, as many of us do, had friends that affirmed their inner identity even as it was hidden to a majority of the outside world. As they grew older, their friends (as many of our friends will do) died. That meant that the friends they had in the gay bars died holding the secret of their gay lives. Many of these women grew up into adulthood without the benefit of a community. For them “gay pride,” “coming out,” and even the word “lesbian” were not words they would ever use in their common conversation. Continue reading “Old and Gay – Dying Alone and Rae’s Friends by Marie Cartier”

Seeing Death and Resurrection by Linn Marie Tonstad

Yesterday, I visited the Capuchin catacombs in Palermo, Sicily. In a grotto about a mile or so from the center of the modern city are found the preserved remains of about 2,000 people who paid the monks to preserve their bodies after death, dress them in their finest clothing, and put them on display. Each of them is placed in its own niche along the wall, held up by iron bands, and has a tag around its neck with its name and date of death. The bodies are not displayed in random order: they are sorted (to some extent) by sex, profession, and familial status. In one large recess, a number of children’s skeletons are on display, many of them in heartbreakingly tiny coffins. In another corridor, friar after friar hangs in his robes, some with cords around their necks signifying their adherence to a Franciscan order. Almost indistinguishable from the cords are the braids still hanging from the heads of some of the women’s bodies. Some families are arranged together; in another corridor doctors and lawyers are segregated and in yet another female virgins are gathered together. The oldest body I saw dated from 1599 – high on a wall hangs the body of a monk whose name was almost illegible but who hailed from the Umbrian hill town of Gubbio.

Some of the skeletons presented death’s heads; others had skin dried to a leathery tightness over remaining bony protuberances. Some of their outfits are well preserved; others have disintegrated under the relentless assault of the years. The practice became illegal around 1880, but until then, people chose – or perhaps their relatives chose for them – to be preserved in this seemingly macabre manner. Continue reading “Seeing Death and Resurrection by Linn Marie Tonstad”

Where do Cats Go?: Reflections on Death Post Patriarchal Christianity by Sara Frykenberg

The reason I am speaking about death today is two-fold. First, I have been somewhat preoccupied with the concept of death since entering a new decade of my life. I no longer believe in the evangelical vision of heaven I learned about in my youth; but as an uncomfortable “un”-Christian, I also have no satisfactory vision to replace it. Or rather, there are many visions I find appealing, but none that I “believe in,” as I had believed in heaven. My family is getting older, my parents have been sick in the last few years, and I often feel that I have more to lose now than I used to.

My second reason for considering death today is that last Wednesday, Mimi, our family cat of 24 years—yes, 24—passed away. After spending all nine of her lives living, Mimi could no longer eat and was suffering. My mother had her put down after we all said goodbye; we held a funeral for her and buried her among the lilies in our yard, her home.

My sisters and myself were very, very saddened by Mimi’s passing; but my mother took it hardest of all. Mimi had been her companion, her friend, her lap warmer, her snuggle buddy, her alarm clock and, we often joked, her favorite child for over two decades. I wanted to comfort my mother; but my protest that it didn’t matter what the (her) Church said, Mimi was with the God/dess, was maybe, not very helpful. It perhaps, only reminded her that in her view, I too am not going to heaven.

I remember sitting in church, as a child being told that animals did not have souls and that there was no “kitty heaven.” That was perhaps, one of the first times in my life that I thought, “that’s just ridiculous,” in a church. Not just ridiculous, but mean and cruel even. “What,” I thought, “is the point in saying such a thing?” Continue reading “Where do Cats Go?: Reflections on Death Post Patriarchal Christianity by Sara Frykenberg”