Facing death with hope

In C.S. Lewis' The Screwtape Letters, Wormwood rhapsodized to the wrong demon about the harvest of souls he anticipated from the Great War unfolding on the European continent. War is the last thing we want, chided Screwtape. All that war is likely to do is awaken people's senses.

"How much better for us if all humans died in costly nursing homes amid doctors who lie, nurses who lie, friends who lie, as we have trained them, promising life to the dying, encouraging the belief that sickness excuses every indulgence, and even, if our workers do their job, withholding all suggestion of a priest, lest it should betray to the sick man his true condition."

My friend's brother-in-law, a man in his 40s, was suffering from an aggressive cancer. The wife (my friend's sister) screamed at the doctor when he prescribed hospice. My friend had a pamphlet called "Facing Death With Hope," but would have to read it to her brother-in-law on the sly. The opportunity came when they all went out for a lunch break and she was alone with him.

He listened attentively, devoured it greedily. Everyone else was telling him he was going to get better, but he knew he was dying and didn't even know how to die. Here is an excerpt from the pamphlet:

"Face it as Jesus did. Jesus was not a stoic when he died. He looked death in the eye, felt keenly its pain and degradation, its horror and loss, and then trusted his heavenly Father. He said, 'Into your hands I commend my spirit.' These words were not calm, cool, and collected. They're the words of a man fully engaged with his troubles, fully engaged with God. And bringing the two together in honest neediness and honest gratitude. The two sides of faith---the need and the joy---are both present in Jesus' experience."

He passed away a week later.

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