We don't give death serious thought unless we come face to face with it. Confronting death, we see clearly that we must leave behind all the things we possess, even our ideas, insights, and all that we think is 'ours'.
We sense the transitoriness of all that is created and know that we must part from our family and detach ourselves from all relationships.
We have no clue as to what will happen next. Do all the cherished memories of this life just vanish into oblivion? We are afraid and the element of uncertainty only adds to the intensity of fear.
The process of dying, interestingly, is woven into the fabric of life. There is a continuous cycle of death and birth in the seasons; winter gives way to spring.
The sun sets before it rises again, and each day and night display before our very eyes the continuous cycle of death and birth.
The varying shades of brown and green leaves speak of a constant process of life giving birth to life but not before the process of dying. The countless cells in our body die only to be replaced by new cells.
In our minds we experience the constant birth and death of myriad thoughts and ideas that are here one moment and have disappeared the next.
Death is an abstraction we fear. Dying, however, is a daily reality that we can learn to accept. The Death and Resurrection of Jesus is all about death and dying. The celebration is meant to take away the 'sting of death'.
The central message of the Easter Season is that if the process of 'dying' is integrated into one's life, then we need not be afraid of death, when it comes.
Death thus becomes an event in life. The Gospel of John tells us that Jesus went to Jerusalem after raising Lazarus from the dead, knowing full well that he would meet with his own impending death.
Here was Jesus, walking right into it not with any sense of bitterness and anger but with a sense of anticipation and joy in the full realisation that it would be His hour of triumph.
Here is one who is not afraid of death because his whole life has been a process of dying. During his life, Jesus was at pains to put this message across to his disciples and when he spoke of 'rising from the dead'.
Fear of death is largely linked to the ego. It is what we are most attached to that we are afraid of losing. The larger the influence of the ego, the greater the fear of death.
The way of the Cross which Jesus invites his disciples to follow is the way of daily dying to self. It is not a way that ends in death, but in His Resurrection.
We learn this from the stillness of meditation as it leads us into the present moment in all our daily activity. The faithful recitation of the word in our practice of meditation teaches us to turn our attention away from the ego and learn to live in the present moment.
"In the pre-sent moment, we experience a fullness of life that liberates us from the fear of death. Rooted in the present we can see the rising and falling of things which is the process of dying that renews and deepens life".