That Good Night
10/27/06
October 27, 1914 was the birthday of Welsh poet and writer Dylan Thomas, regarded as among the greatest poets of the twentieth century.
His most widely quoted poem is "Do not go gentle into that good night," which begins thus:
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
It ends with what is thought to be a plea to his own dying father:
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
We are full of contradictions, we human beings. This life and world, even if we could live in it forever, could never contain or fulfill our desires. We are made for more than this life.
The gain that is ours when we die belonging to Christ is beyond calculation or imagination, but what a loss we feel at contemplating the wrenching event of our death.
Death is hard. “Untimely deaths” as we call them are hard, but even aged dying is a laborious task, fraught and frightful — an inevitable mystery.
It would be helpful perhaps if we could practice for it. But how can we? Our faith gives us just the way to do so by asking us to examine our consciences every night. Every night’s sleep is a mini death with its dying of the light of day. And every morning is a mini resurrection, a new and grateful beginning.
If we get used to preparing ourselves to die each night, we prepare our souls for the great transition that is death. We realize that if we should die in the holy love of God, we have friends to help us depart this life and begin our new existence. The following short prayer can remind us of this:
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,
I give you my heart and soul.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,
assist me now and in my last agony.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,
may I breathe forth my soul in peace with you.
Our petition for Mary to pray for us sinners “at the hour of our death” and the Our Father petition, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” both turn our minds toward last moments in this life and to the final test that we may have to undergo. Dying is a serious thing and it takes our whole life to prepare for it.
Will we rage against it? Perhaps. But in the end no amount of raging will keep us from facing the loss of everything we have, the separation from those we love, and the reckoning with how we have spent the talents God gave us that must come at the end.
Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,
may I breathe forth my soul in peace with you.
