Dealing With The Dying
Studies on death, dying, bereavement, and related topics flooded the market in the 1970s. The subject is no longer a taboo topic but a fad, and it is becoming institutionalized as a solidly established area for study, research, and professional training.
Some of the fascination with death and dying flows from efforts to deny unpleasant realities and even to work toward biological immortality (“emortality”). Yet apparently the only human cells that are “immortal” (without a limit to the number of possible divisions) are the abnormal malignant cells of cancer. As Christiaan Barnard, the famed transplant surgeon, emphasizes: “Man’s search for immortality is gaining ground.” But this is disturbing, for “Although long-term survival may benefit the individual, there is cause to think that it would be of great harm to the species as a whole” (Good Life/Good Death, Prentice-Hall, 1980; p. 134).
Subtitled “A Doctor’s Case for Euthanasia and Suicide,” Barnard’s essays emphasize that the control over death through both passive and active ending of human life is no more a form of “playing God” than is our defensive and offensive warfare, prevention of spontaneous abortion, birth control and family planning, abortion, and medical treatment of illness. The agnostic son of a minister, he makes many comments about God, the Christian faith, altruism, world religions, and similar topics. All are alleged to be in the interest of promoting the aim of physicians, which he believes to be higher than retarding the rate of dying: “the most vital aim of all—to ensure the patient’s capacity to live to the fullest extent of his abilities” (pp. vii–viii). He recognizes that making mere biological existence into a supreme value is a perversion of Christian faith. Barnard’s essay is must reading for all who are concerned with the complex ethical issues related to death and dying.
Most scholarly works in this field take a secular point of view. For example, A Time to Grieve: Loss As a Universal Human Experience, by Bertha G. Simos (Family Service Association of America, 1979), was written to help professionals deal with mental health issues related to all kinds of losses (psychological security, basic skills, communication, appreciation, occupation and financial status, and the whole personality). Though the work has only a few nonindexed, casual references to religion, it is still an excellent resource for clergy, counselors, social workers, and others who are often confronted with the personal problems related to death.
Even more typical of the predominant mood in academia is Kathy Charmaz’s The Social Reality of Death: Death in Contemporary America (Addison-Wesley, 1980). Like most textbook writers, she almost completely ignores religion and spiritual values except for a passing reference to “secular spiritualism.” She includes in this the out-of-the-body accounts by persons who were clinically dead and then revived through emergency medical intervention. The conclusions of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and Raymond Moody are played up, but the contrasting findings of Maurice S. Rawlings, M.D. (Beyond Death’s Door, Thomas Nelson, 1978), are ignored. His significant work in cardiopulmonary resuscitation reveals a high proportion of horrifying experiences immediately following resuscitation that are repressed later, leaving only pleasant memories.
Charmaz’s textbook contains excellent summaries of research related to death. Her interpretations from an existentialist and Marxist perspective are probably indicative of an emerging scholarly consensus that includes elements both in agreement with, and antithetical to, Christian values.
Inspirational writings on the subject are numerous. Among them is Dying, Death and Destiny (Revell, 1980) written by Herbert Lockyer at the age of 93. The book emerged from his rich experiences in pastoral ministries, lecturing, writing, and the long invalidism and death of his wife. These fluently written and clearly evangelical meditations are not only excellent for people who are confronting death and bereavement, but for pastors seeking grist for sermons as well.
We Die Before We Live: Talking with the Very Ill (Seabury, 1980) is a literary piece with a message. It records in prose and poetry the sentiments, thoughts, and impressionistic reactions of Daniel Berrigan, the activist Catholic priest, while he worked as a part-time volunteer in Saint Rose’s Home, a hospital for victims of poverty who are dying of cancer. The book enables readers to appreciate the diversity, richness of spirit, suffering, and comradeship of down-and-out patients terminally ill with cancer. It also helps them appreciate the faith basis of the “gestures of life” of Berrigan’s demonstrations against “the politics of cancer.” His passion for social reform permeates almost every page.
Personal experiences provide the basis for efforts by many writers to help others who are caught in similar predicaments. Mark Peachey’s Facing Terminal Illness (Herald Press, 1981) is a pastor’s brief account of the struggles he faced in his battle with terminal cancer. He became acutely “aware of the subtle temptation to focus my attention on miracle or medicine, rather than resting my faith in God. My faith transcends both medicine and miracle” (pp. 37–8).
While the importance of social support emerges clearly in all of these studies, it is the central theme of Sandra Hayward Albertson, who describes the comfort and help of friends during the illness and dying of her young husband in Endings and Beginnings (Random House, 1980). The Quakers in Friends Meetings inconvenienced themselves again and again to provide the couple and their two children with material, emotional, and celebrative help. Like others, she reacted negatively to some attempted “spiritual” forms of aid: “I did not believe that there was any divine willing of this crisis for us. Those who spoke of ‘God’s will’ offered no comfort to me at all” (pp. 20–1).
After the Last Heartbeat (Christian Herald Books, 1980) is the life story of Tom Scarinci (as told to Will Norton, Jr.), who is now a counselor and campus pastor. The ups and downs of his spiritual and family life, occupational experiences, and 32 hospitalizations reached a climax when his heart stopped during surgery. Despite the length of time when insufficient oxygen was getting to the brain, innovative medical procedures (reported in two medical journals) spared his life and brought him, as if from the grave, back to active service. The well-written account includes his own out-of-the-body sensations. It reads like a novel, describing God’s persistent leading, prodding, and chastising of one called to serve him in the ministry.
People considering caring for a terminally ill or chronically handicapped person in the home will find Home Care: A Practical Alternative to Extended Hospitalization (Celestial Arts, 1980) an exceptionally good how-to-do-it manual. Written by Evelyn M. Baulch, widow of a pastor whose death followed years of invalidism, it is well organized and easy to use for reference as well as for educational and sensitizing purposes. The final chapter’s “focus on infinity” emphasizes that “a spiritual base is an absolute essential, not only in the role of healing, but in daily living” (p. 229). The book’s orientation toward caring for the whole person is refreshing. Although it is not explicitly evangelical, and occasionally recommends resources of borderline validity, it is an excellent handbook for pastors, counselors, and church libraries.
The Hospice Way of Death (Human Sciences Press, 1980), by Paul M. Du-Bois, is an introductory description and evaluation of the hospice movement. It is cluttered with excessive details about specific programs and does not provide the clear evaluation readers are led to expect; however, it will be useful to people who are planning hospice programs. The text contains only a few passing bows to the clergy and religion. Like many other textbooks on these subjects, one does not find what he does not seek.
Every pastor and leader dealing with issues of death and dying ought to read Encounter with Terminal Illness (Zondervan, 1980), by Ruth Lewshenia Kopp, M.D., with Stephen Sorenson. Dr. Kopp and her husband have a medical practice specializing in hematology and oncology (blood and tumor study and treatment); most of their patients have diseases with little hope for cure. She deals with denial in terminal illness, the patient and his doctor, terminal illness and the family, responses to terminal illness, and the approach of death—all in the context of Christian values, which permeate the entire discussion.
Guidelines for action, like “being an ideal patient,” are provided repeatedly, and both the advantages and the mistakes of typical Christian attitudes are discussed perceptively. Kopp warns, for example, of hiding behind “spiritual” prayers, and of the dangers of “spiritual pride” and selfish motives that arise both when we are stricken personally and when we serve others. Feminists will not appreciate her use of male pronouns throughout, and almost exclusively with reference to doctors, sick persons, and spouses. Though she occasionally gives too much emphasis to the physician’s authority, it is tempered with the idea of teamwork and the patient assuming “his share of responsibility in his treatment program.” These flaws are minor in what is a masterpiece for both professional and lay people. It is filled with human interest anecdotes from extensive medical experience, making it light, yet forceful, reading.
Reading this rich collection, I sometimes wished that each of the authors had benefited from the insights and experiences of all the others. But the reader can!
Various books on death reviewed by David O. Moberg, professor of sociology, Marquette University, Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
What About Me?
Feeling Good About Your Feelings, by Barry Applewhite (Victor, 1980, 118 pp., $3.50), is reviewed by Bill Chickering, a writer living in Florida.
The author of this book worked for five years with the Atomic Energy Commission in a job that required a precise, logical, and unemotional personality.
After that time, however, he sensed a shift of direction in his life. Quitting his job, he entered seminary, and later the pastoral ministry. There he found that people in his church did not often function in unemotional, logical ways. While some members appreciated his sermons for their precision and their abundance of facts, others wondered if there was any emotion beneath his seemingly placid exterior. Group encounters with leaders of the church brought him face to face, sometimes painfully, with the reality of his emotions. This book is the result of research done after those encounters.
Anger, sorrow, joy, anxiety, fear, love, and compassion are emotions often suppressed by Christians. They fear that emotional expression implies weakness, so many Christians walk around with radiant, cast-iron exteriors and churning insides.
Applewhite has written a balanced scriptural study of emotions and how Christians can express them without guilt, feeling they have fallen short of God’s desires. Emotional expression, within limits, is not only not wrong, but necessary. The book assures the reader that there are many examples within Scripture in which emotional expression was called for—to have remained silent and stoic would have been wrong.
The section in the book on compassion—described as “being moved by another person’s distress and desiring to relieve it by giving crucial help”—is most useful. Here the author discusses the ways Christians avoid being compassionate by scripturally rationalizing away or minimizing the problem of the person in distress. The author does not counsel his reader to make any other Christian the dumping ground for all his suppressed emotions, realizing that discernment must be used in order for the truly compassionate Christian to avoid being abused.
The opening chapter’s discussion on the emotions of God and how theologians and philosophers have often brushed them off was good, but far too cursory to serve as a solid foundational base.
This book should prove helpful to those in a counseling ministry, and the study leader’s guide offered with the book should provide some lively grist for adult Sunday school sessions.
New Light On Calvin
Reformatio Perennis. Essays on Calvin and the Reformation in Honor of Ford Lewis Battles, edited by B. A. Gerrish in collaboration with Robert Benedetto (Pickwick, 1981, 213 pp., $12.95), is reviewed by Donald K. McKim, assistant professor of theology, University of Dubuque Theological Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa.
One of the lamentable losses of recent years was Ford Lewis Battles, who died in November 1979. Battles, a classicist, Calvin scholar, and translator of the Library of Christian Classics edition of the Institutes, served on the faculties of Hartford, Pittsburgh, and Calvin seminaries. Now Brian Gerrish of the University of Chicago has edited essays on Calvin and the Reformation in Battles’s honor in the Pittsburgh Theological Monograph Series. These contributions from highly respected scholars will be welcomed by all interested in Calviniana, Reformation studies, and the “continual Reformation” of the church.
The essays on Calvin include explorations of the Reformer’s teaching on the Law, by I. John Hesselink; the Eucharist, by Joseph Tylenda; the will, by John Leith; and the doctrine of God, by Gerrish. In his essay, “Theology Within the Limits of Piety Alone: Schleiermacher and Calvin’s Doctrine of God,” Gerrish argues that in both Calvin and Schleiermacher the concept of piety “functions to exclude inadmissible material and to control the treatment of what is admitted” in theology. In this way Gerrish hopes to show “a closer relationship between Reformation and liberal Protestantism than is commonly recognized.”
The English, Scottish, and Polish Reformations are dealt with in essays by Battles’s former colleagues Robert S. Paul, James K. Cameron and George H. Williams. Paul writes on ecclesiology and religion in England, Cameron on Scottish Calvinism and the principle of intolerance. Williams’s essay suggests the interesting thesis that had Calvin better perceived the weaknesses of John Laski, the Reformed church in the Polish-Lithuanian world might have become a more major force.
Church and state is the issue in two concluding essays. Robert Kingdon studies “The Function of Law in the Political Thought of Peter Martyr Vermigli,” and Markus Barth examines “The State of the Free: Romans 13:1–7 in the Context of Paul’s Theology.” Barth claims Paul’s teachings do not condone either political cowardice or social noninvolvement.
Peter De Klerk contributes a bibliography of Battles’s writings at the end of the volume, and Donald G. Miller provides a warm word of appreciation for this remarkable scholar, teacher, and churchman.
Briefly Noted
Two diverse topics are presented in this survey: missions and C. S. Lewis. One deals with the state of world evangelization, the other with Christian creativity. Both are the expressions of the Spirit of God within us, impelling us to make our faith known.
Missions. Four books deal more or less with personalities on the mission field: The Expendable Mary Slessor (Seabury), by James Buchan, is about the marvelous woman who went to Africa in the 1800s and became known as “the mother of all the peoples.” She once said, “Creeds and ministers and books are all good enough but look you to Jesus.” The Savage My Kinsman (Servant), by Elisabeth Elliot, is now revised and in paperback. Something Meaningful for God (Herald), edited by Cornelius J. Dyck, is a collection of 15 Mennonite missionary biographies. No Fear in His Presence (Regal), by David Dawson, is a marvelous story of faith in God amid the terrors of war-torn Zaïre.
Several studies of missions have appeared. The Christian World Mission: Today and Tomorrow (Baker), by J. Herbert Kane, takes a good look at the whole subject, ranging from the biblical basis to continuing problems. T.E.E. in Japan (William Carey), by W. Frederic Sprunger, offers a realistic look at the feasibility of theological education by extension in that country; it could serve as a model study for other countries as well. Nationalism: Case and Crisis in Missions (privately published: Rudelsweiherstr 15A, 852 Erlangen, W. Germany), by Paul Von Tuche, is a Ph.D. dissertation on German missions in British India, 1939–16. It is exceptionally well done and packed with information. Reaching the Arabs (William Carey), by Tim Matheny, adopts a felt-need approach to the problem. Christ’s Lordship and Religious Pluralism (Orbis), edited by Gerald H. Anderson and Thomas F. Stransky, is a multi-authored work of great value, containing views from left to right.
Irving Hexham writes a proud and challenging study in The Irony of Apartheid: The Struggle for National Independence of Afrikaner Calvinism Against British Imperialism (Edwin Mellen).
C. S. Lewis. Some very good material has appeared lately. C. S. Lewis (Ungar), by Margaret Patterson Hannay, is an excellent introduction to Lewis, containing a biographical sketch, summary of his major works, survey of major themes, and analysis of his literary technique. C. S. Lewis: The Visionary Christian (MacMillan), by Chad Walsh, is 131 readings arranged topically, covering everything from “Plato’s Perfect City” to “Modem Music.” Richard L. Purtill nicely explains Lewis’s apologetics in C. S. Lewis’s Case for the Christian Faith (Harper & Row). C. S. Lewis and the Church of Rome (Ignatius), by Christopher Derrick, is called “a study in Proto-Ecumenism.” He finds evidence that Lewis could have become a Roman Catholic (likeliest in 1950), even if he never did.
New reprints of Lewis’s works have also appeared, continuing a steady stream: The Screwtape Letters with Screwtape Proposes a Toast (Doubleday/Image) and The Pilgrim’s Regress (Bantam).
