The Rite of Dying: The Role of Ritual in Death

By Magdalyn Sebastian

As a Christian minister, I have witnessed death many times. I have been there days or hours before someone has died, at the moment of death and immediately afterwards. I have been witness to and have experienced the wide gambit of emotions and reactions to this all too human event. But on a certain sunny June day not too long ago, I felt uneasy and troubled as I made my way down Rt. 146 to a parishioner’s home. With all my wide experiences of death, why did today trouble me so?

Perhaps I was out of sorts because the person dying was a true beloved of mine from my former congregation. Perhaps I was troubled because the journey that I had traveled with her had been a long one. This was her third round of cancer, diagnosed over a year ago—just a couple of months after she and I found her husband dead on their living room couch. I had taken her to diagnostic appointments and treatments. I had held her hand after she was told that there was nothing else to do.

I needed to do something. I just felt the need to mark this time, this visit as special— probably as much for me as for her. What should I say? What could I do? From our Christian perspective, this was a passage, not an ending. How to recognize, celebrate and honor this moment? I was glad that her daughter’s house was twenty miles from my own. It gave time to think.

Arnold van Gennep is credited with coining the phrase “rite of passage” in 1960 in his book, Rites of Passage. All rites, according to van Gennep, include three phases: 1) separation from the old status; 2) transition; and 3) incorporation in the new status. Victor Turner, author of The Ritual Process helps us to understand the need for the community and individual to officially recognize these passages. According to Turner, “Change in an individual’s life is a potential threat to the whole social group, which knows how to treat someone who is in a clearly defined state, but not someone who hovers between states.” Therefore rites of passage were developed to help regulate these upsetting transitional stages.

Our problem in 2003 in the United States, however, seems to be that our rites of passage have been regulated and usurped by powers that do not have our emotional and spiritual well-being foremost in mind. A number of years ago, Margaret Mead noted this phenomenon while serving as an advisor to the Episcopal Church. Specifically addressing the rites of passage for youth, Mead remarked, “The hallmarks of adulthood in our culture are not negotiated by the church, but by the schools, the government, and other social structures.” Arguably, these secular institutions could not have so easily seized the ability to direct our rites of passage if our religious institutions were more responsive to people. Beyond how our institutions of faith may have failed us at some point, I would also lay some of the blame of our distorted rites of passage at the door of corporate America. I would expand the list of institutional usurpers to include corporations and others who stand to earn money from selling the trinkets and paraphernalia we are indoctrinated to believe we need for all rites of passage—be it party trimmings for graduation parties, silver knives to cut our wedding cakes or caskets with satin linings to dispose of our dead.

How we envision and act out our rites of passage seems to have spiraled out of our control. We can no longer fully define what constitutes a passage or what the rite should be without an advertising brochure. And what rituals we participate in have either little meaning or a meaning that may be counter to our own values.

“There is no such thing as a natural death: nothing that happens to a person is ever natural since his or her presence calls the world into question. All people must die: but for everyone death is an accident and, even if a person knows it and consents to it, an unjustifiable violation.”

— Simon deBeauvior

Death is one of those rites of passage that is in desperate need of being taken back by the people who experience it – everyone. In order to begin to re-vision death for ourselves and for our loved ones, we must consider a few points.

First of all, American society is scared to death of death. There was a time when death was very much a part of everyday life. People died at home, were prepared for burial by the family, “laid out” in the home—if that was the cultural tradition—and often buried in the family or church plot. Death was seen as the passage into a wonderful, idyllic place. The explosion of science in the last few centuries turned people’s view of the universe and of the Divine upside down. Uncertainty made death seem “far more dreadful, the focus of terrible imaginings.” As medical science advanced, we became separated from the dying process, much as we became separated from the birthing process. Death, we came to understand, was a failure of science and ultimately a betrayal of our Divine. Death became “a disease that doctors should be able to cure.” While the hospice movement has done much recently to humanize death, we as a culture still do not want to discuss death, particularly our own, nor do we want to see it. American society tends to worship the new, the emerging. Death is antithetical to that trend.

As an Adult Child of an Alcoholic who craves as much control in life as she can get, I even understand that I will need to embrace and accept my own death—at some point. Change is never easy. Encountering the unknown is unsettling. Fear of death is at some level natural and, unfortunately I believe, our culture feeds that fear. Death is that space of “transition” that Turner talked about — that space that is threatening to the social order. Cookie-cutter funerals—and we have all been to those—serve to regulate the unpleasant emotions of grief. But to reclaim death as a rite of passage means to claim it as something human and divine. We must reintegrate it into life by exploring our own feelings about death and by developing meaningful rituals that can serve to help those involved—the dying as well as the grieving—leave behind the old status of life and transition to a new status.

Another point to consider in thinking of death as a rite of passage is that death is not predictable. The journey that I have been privileged to share with my former parishioner has been Holy because of the knowledge of what will be. We know that death is coming and so the dying and the grieving have sacred opportunities for conversation and ritual. Car accidents and acts of violence disregard such human needs. We tend to quickly mourn what might have been. We shout “not fair,” “too young,” “so much to live for.” We want to control those unpleasant emotions around grief and dictate when death is appropriate.

During a class on ministering to the dying and grieving in seminary, a minister on sabbatical from Australia joined our class. He talked about his first years in his parish where, as the only minister for miles around, he was called on to do literally hundreds of funerals. He shared a story about when his congregation suffered the loss of an elderly woman and a young boy in the same week. When his young daughter questioned him about the circumstances of the elderly woman’s death, he used the phrases, “It was her time,” and “She had lived her life.” His daughter, full of child-wisdom, said, “Oh, just like Tommy,” the young boy who had recently died. It was a powerful moment for the minister. When death is sudden and unexpected, can it also be the right time? How then should we as humans address a rite of passage for a death that has come without warning? What rituals will help us as grievers deal with anger, injustice, profound loss and bewilderment?

Finally, there are two groups of people with similar and yet very different needs in death—the dying and the grieving. I felt that keenly with my parishioner. Ethically as a minister, I needed to be sure that what I chose to recognize as her rite of passage met her needs as the dying person. If another or different ritual was necessary for her family, then I needed to explore it. If my needs were met by these acts, well, that was a bonus. Perhaps later, I would need to come up with my own ritual, away from those to whom I ministered, to mark her passage.

Unfortunately in our culture of death denial, the grieving friends and family have such a difficult time facing what is happening that they develop elaborate ruses to pretend that death is not coming. They are afraid to say the “D” word to the sick person for fear of traumatizing them or taking away their hope. Similarly, if they say “dying” out loud, they may have to face the reality themselves. The dying person may not be fully aware of their condition. When do you tell them? When do you keep silent? It becomes a game of pretend in which a sacred rite of passage is not honored as it could be because the players just cannot face it.

There really was not time to think about a rite of passage when my own mother died. Things seemed to happen too quickly and yet in slow motion. It was my sister-in-law, Marilyn, who decided to meet Mom’s needs before her own and told my mother that she was dying. My mother had battled multiple bowel obstructions, a spiral break to her arm, bedsores, heart failure and sepsis—all complicated by diabetes and advanced age in a matter of weeks. My mother, ever the optimist, was fighting on. When her systems were finally failing, Marilyn told Mom that it was not looking good. “Oh really?” mother replied. After discussing the possibility of going on a respirator, my mother outlined when it would be permissible and when “to pull the plug.” It gave the family that was present and my mother at least a few moments to come to terms with her upcoming passage. She died later that day. It was up to us after her death to mark her passage and our own.

Rituals help us act out the emotions and stages that mark our continual journey of life. Whether it is a weekly ritual of acting out the Last Supper of Jesus during Holy Communion as a way to remember sacrifice, forgiveness and community, singing happy birthday around a cake ablaze with dozens of candles or burying our dead in the ground, our rituals help us navigate those transitional periods as we move from one status to another. From the fractured person, to one made whole through their Savior, from a teen to an adult, from life on earth to another plane of existence, our rituals can help us to make sense out of the events in life.

To see how we can use rituals—standardized or wholly our own—to help us mark death as a rite of passage, let us examine van Gennep’s definition of rite of passage. According to van Gennep, the first phase is the separation from the old status. Death is a separation from life as we know it on Earth. The journey to death may be a long one in which we witness a person slowly changing. Her memory may get fuzzy; he may no longer live alone; she may not be able to participate in activities which once brought her joy; he may languish in pain or oblivion for a time. However long the journey, when the moment of death comes, it is an abrupt and permanent termination—a harsh separation from the old status.
The second phase of a rite of passage is transition. Some may call the dying process itself that transition. Whether it is the end phase of aging or the slow crawl through illness, many would say that dying is the transition. Others would argue that the transition from the old status to the new status is that split second moment of death. It is hard to catch, almost imperceptible, and impossible to discuss with the person experiencing it. For me, this interpretation of transition provides great meaning. Transition as the moment of death helps to explain what happens in sudden death. Counter to both ideas, may be the philosophy that all of life is the transition for death.

From this side of the equation—from the perspective of the living—incorporation into the new status must be accomplished by those who do not actually experience the new status. There can be rituals for the dying person in anticipation of her incorporation into her new status. But once she crosses that mystical threshold, her incorporation is really in her hands and the hands of her Divine Power. Those who are left behind, however, have a need to honor the person’s incorporation into their new status. This honoring has manifested itself as funeral rites from every known culture in all parts of the world. Some of these rituals are meaningful and comforting while some are stale, insensitive and an affront to the grieving and the dead.

“Although we cannot choose never to die, we can make choices about how we die, and we can choose to die with our own style.”

— Marjorie Casebier McCoy

So how do we do this marking of the rite of passage of death in meaningful ways for the dying and the grieving? Elaine Ramshaw and Sarah York in their texts have one word—Listen. Listen to the person dying. Listen to those grieving. Listen to yourself. Draw on the experiences of life that have been meaningful and create a ritual that speaks to you, to those present, to your spiritual/religious beliefs, to your needs. Listening is respect. Listening is honor. Listening is allowing space for a power greater than ourselves to help us through one of the most difficult, profound and awesome rites of passage.

How many of us have been present at a traditional funeral service that in one sense comforted because of its familiarity — well this is what you do when someone dies — and yet was lacking? The funeral just seemed to be a photocopy image of every other service you had ever attended and, therefore, had little meaning. Earlier this year, I was asked by a parishioner to preside at a graveside service for her sister-in-law who had died out-of-state. I never met the woman, but knew how important it was for Betty to have a Christian service. I quizzed her and other family members about the deceased prior to Shirley’s remains arriving from Florida. Everyone met at a family member’s house, many making the trip from Florida to New York. We caravanned to the cemetery in sports cars, on motorcycles, in vans and in my little Geo. A daughter placed Shirley’s cremated remains in the small grave. I went through my service, trying to incorporate the stories I had learned of Shirley’s life. I opened the service up for others to share their stories. Pretty soon, one of the sons brought forward a bottle of beer and placed it beside the box holding Shirley’s remains. “One for the road, Mom.” After I said my final prayer, someone popped open a trunk and many of the family grabbed a beer. They tearfully stood around the open grave having a last drink with Shirley. Was it a ritual that had meaning for me? No. But it was meaningful for those present. They needed to act out this rite of passage of their mother’s—to honor her new status. For them, this signified the promise that someday they would share a “virtual” drink with Mom again when they made their rite of passage.

What to Do?

Have a conversation with yourself. First listen to yourself about what death means to you. Are you like most people in this culture? Are you scared to death of death? Why? Be honest with yourself. What do you believe death to be? Is there some old parental or religious tape running in your head that gets in the way of accepting death as a passage? You cannot develop a rite of passage for yourself or others if you have flotsam in the way.
What’s important to you? If you could orchestrate your dying, what would bring meaning for you? For my Aunt Betty, it was gathering us around her telling stories and sharing Holy Communion. Because of her communication and honesty, her passing was one of the most sacred events I have ever witnessed. Whatever is meaningful for you—surrounded by loved ones, incense, the recitation of sacred texts – know what you want. If you died, what rite would you suggest to celebrate your life and honor your passage to a new status?

Have a conversation with your loved ones. Tell them your visions and listen to theirs. Write them down and stick them somewhere accessible and known. Revise them regularly and openly. You will not be the same person tomorrow as you are today; your choices may change. My spouse and I have had many conversations that have started, “I want this or that at my funeral.” In twenty-four years of marriage, our requests have changed, but we each have a good idea of what the other one wants to honor their new status. We have had honest conversations about what we thought we could not do for the other. York even suggests having conversations about, “What if I died suddenly?” What would you suggest for your loved ones to offer comfort in such an instance?

Be gentle with yourself and your loved ones. We often do not have all the choices we would wish for in our dying. Some things just cannot happen the way in which we envision them. But as long as there are threads of what has meaning for you, then you, your family and your image of the Divine will be able to honor your separation from your old status.
What about the grieving? I have officiated at many funerals and can attest to the tension between the deceased’s desires for his/her funeral and what the family wants. York relates a story of a parishioner that stated she did not want a funeral. York responded, “Eunice, you won’t be in a position to have much to say about that.” I have had similar conversations. On one hand, funerals and rites to honor the deceased and celebrate their life are for the living. The purpose is to help the grieving accept the passage and to help them begin to work through the grief. However, creating a rite that is completely alien and perverse to the deceased is not listening, is not respecting and is not honoring. It must be a blending of desire and need. It must be meaningful and it does not have to be the only rite. Remember that the rites after the person has died are the livings’ way of honoring that person’s absorption into their new status. It should also recognize that because of the loss of that person in their daily life, they have transitioned into a new status as well. A different rite(s), after the funeral, may be in order.

Often we are unable to recognize the rite of passage of death. Anger, resentment, guilt and other highly charged emotions are in the way. A standard funeral at the time of death may be all that we are capable of doing. However, in the months and years following that passage, we may have time to work through these feelings and develop a ritual that can honor the deceased’s rite of passage and our own. York shares a story of a woman who was angry with her husband for “smoking himself to death.” Therapy and support groups did not seem to be able to help her work through her feelings. Finally, after seeing her husband in a dream, young and healthy again, she knew what she must do. She had to sacrifice something meaningful of her husband’s in order to let go of her anger and to let go of him. The woman took a diamond from a bracelet her husband had given her, went to the ocean, and threw the diamond into the sea. Her feelings no longer controlled her, and she had passed into a new status.

Victor Parachin, one of many people writing on grief, emphasizes that grief takes a long time — years. Grief is not constant, but spirals and fluctuates. Grief is different for each person. Creating rituals to recognize the new status or perhaps the long transition for the survivor to that new status is completely up to the griever. Rituals can be unique; they can incorporate traditional religious images; they can be something that is shared with other grievers.

The Jewish tradition recognizes this need and has rituals to mark the anniversaries of death. Similarly, masses may be said in the Roman Catholic tradition on the anniversary of death. My husband and I lost our mothers nine days apart in the summer of 2001. That Thanksgiving, as we began to ready the table for our “feast,” my husband suddenly became frantic (my description) to do something to remember our moms at our meal. And while I grumbled and complained because the wound was too fresh for me, I am glad that he pushed for a ritual. While we smiled at the suggestion that we burn the dinner rolls to remember his mother, we ultimately made name cards and wrote why we were thankful for each other as a way of remembering Tim’s mom. My mother was represented by one of her cherished, beautiful cut glass dishes filled with old, discolored, smoky Scrabble pieces from her beloved game board. I felt my mother’s presence in those Scrabble pieces. These small rituals helped us to laugh and cry and tell stories marking our new status as motherless adults and our mothers’ new status as transitioned beings.

Our rituals must be our own as our rites of passage are our own. Cathryn Russell wrote a beautiful article in the last issue of Journal of Family Living about birth and death. She and her husband, Dave, chose the ritual of burying the placenta of their newborn son, Madison, in their sacred place in the pine forests of Montana. It was the recognition of the passage of Madison to his new status outside of the womb as well as their new status as parents. Later, when their beloved dog, Roxanne, died, Cathryn, Dave and Madison took Roxanne to her sacred space in the backyard of Cathryn’s parents. In a spot where Roxanne loved to sit in the sun, they dug a hole and placed their companion in it. They brought offerings of a small Buddha, a bowl of food and water for her journey and incense. It was a rite of passage for Roxanne and for the family, a meaningful recognition of her new status as well as their own.

By the time I got to the daughter’s house, I had decided on what I would offer my beloved if it seemed appropriate. I entered the house where a twin bed had been moved into the living room. There in the bed, looking small and frail was my Betty. I asked if I could sit on the bed next to her, mindful of her comfort. I was allowed. I held her spasmodic hand as we talked frankly. Are you ready? Do you feel like you have anything else to do? Who else would you like to say good-bye to? Are you afraid? It was a holy moment in frank conversation. I said my farewells. I will miss you. This is what you have taught me.

It seemed appropriate to offer her a ritual— recognition of her pending new status. Since she was unable to take communion any longer, which is sacred in our tradition, I offered her an anointing with oil, which is not in our tradition. An anointing seemed right for her need. She accepted. Since anointing is not in the Disciples of Christ tradition, I did not have any aromatic oils to use. Her daughter brought a bowl with a small amount of olive oil in it. I recalled the tradition of anointing from scripture and read Psalm 133. I made the sign of the cross on her head to invoke the tradition of the Trinity. I emphasized to her that anointing was a way of recognizing someone’s holiness; she was sanctified simply in her being a child of God and a part of sacred creation. I took her palm and made the sign of the cross in it recalling for her that just as our Savior suffered, died and was born into new life, so she had suffered, so she will die and so she will be born into new life. By choosing a ritual that was not proscribed by her faith tradition, but yet drew on the images and theology of her tradition, I had the freedom to create something for her that had meaning for her and in the end for me. At the time of this writing, she is still with us, continuing to teach me.

Magdalyn Sebastian is an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and a proud parent of two Albany Free School graduates. She began a chaplain residency at Albany Medical this fall.

She dedicates this article to Rev. Dr. Sharon Thornton, Andover Newton Theological School, "from whom I have learned much about life and death."

Click here to read Magdalyn's poem in this issue titled, Cardiac Arrest.
 

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