My Own Mortality

I was about thirteen years old when I first thought about my own mortality.  I had lost two of my grandparents a few years prior, but never considered my own death until around the time of my thirteenth birthday.  I don’t know if the thought of being a teenager triggered my fear, but it was real.  I was raised Catholic and learned in my catechism classes that If I died with a mortal sin on my soul, I was going to hell.  I didn’t want that.

If you explore the nature of sin on the internet, you’ll find something like this.

There are three main types of sin within the Catholic framework.

• Original sins: Original sin is the sin that Adam committed, and a recognition of our essentially sinful nature. You can only get rid of OS by being baptized, so it’s generally not something Catholics have to worry about after baptism.
• Venial sins: Venial sins are relatively minor spiritual infractions—not the best things to do, but not send-you-to-hell bad either. If you die and you’ve committed venial sins, you’ll still go to heaven (probably). 
• Mortal sins: Mortal sins are the biggies: grave actions committed in full knowledge of their gravity, and with the complete consent of the sinner. You will go to Hell if you’ve committed mortal sins without repenting.

In Catholic theology, it is believed that those who die with venial sins may be purified in Purgatory before entering into full communion with God. The length of time spent in this purifying state varies depending on individual circumstances and level of spiritual development.

I also learned about Limbo.

• Some Roman Catholic theologians have proposed a concept of limbo specifically for infants who die before baptism or outside the Roman Catholic faith.

When my son, David, was born, I was concerned about the prospect of Limbo.  I wondered how God could send an innocent child to such a place.  I consulted with a young priest who laid my fears to rest. He agreed with me that a benevolent God wouldn’t punish an innocent child for the inaction of his parents.

My Catholic instruction went on to explain that I could be forgiven for my sinful ways if I confessed and repented.  Repenting wasn’t a problem for me, but confessing was.  I found confessing to a priest to be a challenge. I didn’t want to sound too bad, so I made a mental list that I felt comfortable reporting.  Impure thoughts were high on the list.  I made it through most confessions but felt challenged if a priest asked for specific numbers.  I wasn’t comfortable with numbers.  I felt mine might be too high.  Feeling guilty for sinning was a part of my process.

I haven’t been to church in several years.  I struggled with the entire today it’s a sin and tomorrow it’s not.  Eating meat on Friday is a simple example.  When I was growing up it was a sin until the Church changed the rules.  It seemed to me that sins were sins.  If God established the first set of rules, how can a bunch of men change them?  That’s my struggle with organized religion.  I know my thoughts are simple, but I think faith in anything shouldn’t be that complicated.  There shouldn’t be a lot of hoops we have to jump through to make a good impression.

Ruth and I talked about our beliefs from time to time.  Most often when the kids, and then grandkids, were born.  We agreed to let our three decide on a path that suited them best.  Most of my references to religion were based on my Catholic upbringing while Ruth’s references were based upon her parents’ Baptist ways.

David had lots of questions about God.  We read bible stories and spoke of good and bad.  We didn’t talk about sin much.  Perhaps never.

We took David, Elizabeth and Michael to church but not on a regular basis.  We were Ceaster Catholics.  We went on Christmas and Easter.  When our three wanted to join their friends at Sunday school, or summer bible classes, we took them. We didn’t care which church hosted the classes.  We took them where they wanted to go. When they asked questions, we answered as best we could. We never lied and did our best at letting them figure things out for themselves.  I think that’s a process that never ends.  We’re always trying to figure out what lies ahead.

When I lost Ruth, I wasn’t concerned about what lied ahead for her.  I was concerned about how she died.  I hoped that she hadn’t suffered.  The police reported a medical incident that led to her crashing her car.  I assumed the medical incident was a heart attack.  That’s the only thing that made sense to my logical brain.  I had to wait several days for that to be confirmed.  The police wouldn’t release the accident report until the medical examiner released the results of Ruth’s autopsy.  I called every day and stopped into the sheriff’s office more than once.  My insistence didn’t expedite their process.

I got the final report about ten days after the accident.  The cause of death was blunt force.  That concerned me.  It wasn’t until I reviewed the report with my doctor that my fear subsided.  He assured me that her heart attack was so severe that she wouldn’t have suffered.  She would have been rendered unconscious immediately.  I’ve lived with that belief ever since.

On February 27th, seventeen months to the day since Ruth’s death, my final fears were laid to rest when, Dani, a member of my Memoir Writers group read about her own death.

TBC