Re: Suicide, the Spirit, & the Church

[barbara wolf <lupa@biddeford.com>]

Molly Wolf says Tue, 9 Jan 1996

>I have a real problem with people who judge suicides as selfish or
>despairing.  It may be that a soul has simply had too much to bear and wants
>to go home. What I do know is that only God knows, and only God has the
>information to pass judgment.

Exactly.  There are times when the Church seems astonishingly unaware that
it is not called to be more zealous in defense of God than our Lord was.  I
am unwilling to accuse the suicide of blasphemy against the Spirit, if that
is indeed the "sin against the Spirit", probably because if I seriously
examine my daily behavior I all too frequently do the same--and I suspect I
am not alone in this.  We all commit our own self-destructive actions on a
variety of levels; we are all idolaters of one sort or another (and for some
of us *parish* or *church*, along with *money* and "respectability*, do from
time to time replace God in our hearts).  There are those who would insist
that many of our revered martyrs actively invited death--was this suicidal?

There are suicides (I have known two) who are essentially trying to *make a
statement* or *get even* with the world.  In such cases, I suppose, one
could posit that they died, as the saying goes, *in sin*.  I suppose too
that the Church could make a case for denying sacramental and burial rites.
But this argument makes me very nervous indeed.  It leads inevitably back to
rigid dependence on Law as a means of determining who gets buried
Christianly (neologism? I needed an adverb just there.)  Which of us can
hope to die when we aren't *in sin*? This is where the Law takes us, with
all the careful lists of which rites may be used for suicides, which part of
the cemetary is appropriate, what mitigating circumstances may be
considered, etc., etc.  It is not what the Crucifixion and Resurrection have
opened to us, and it is not, IMHO, what the Body of Christ should be
offering to God.

Because I don't know all the reasons (God knows), and because I cannot by
any reach of imagination see our Lord walking away from those who long for
*home*, I leave all suicides in his hands, which is where I have left those
two souls I knew.