By Azucena “Ceni” De La Torre
April 3, 2024
Listen to this post.
I have a very warm relationship with death. I grew up in a funeral home, learned to drive in a hearse, and have a fondness for cemeteries that is, at best, probably uncommon. I studied Theology at Duke Divinity School and immediately followed that up with mortuary college. While not conventional, it has resulted in an edifying sequence of education that I did not anticipate. I learned what it meant to preach the resurrection of the dead in a Protestant seminary, and then I found myself in a county morgue. That kind of practicum makes for a sobering spirituality—quickly.
My apartment is filled with boxes upon boxes of books, mugs with Scripture, and somewhere around here is a plushie of Pope Francis. All of these things are sweet reminders of what I say I believe in. Most importantly, reminders of the impossible promise of life after death that is scribbled across the consciousness of Christianity. All of these books that base belief are perfectly safe and sanitary. Their pages are worn from wonder and doubt. These books have housed hope, crafted conversions, and remedied reluctance in the ways that only written work can do.
But books are not bodies. Books don’t die—the best ones just age well.
Far too often, our scope of contemplation towards death is overtly neat and sterile, a byproduct of Western thought. It reminds me of piles of books but the kind you don’t highlight or earmark. They are for display and not discipleship. Our bodies are altogether the very opposite of that. They have stories to tell. This flesh preaches its own theology of recollection, a literal embodiment of memory. This skin races against time and never wins. Humans are designed to heal just as they are designed to decompose. Death is a natural process of coming undone, organically in a very literal sense. The actual sights and smells that accompany dying are stark limits of life. But life, and I do mean real life, is messy in every way. Death is no different. Unpleasantly embarrassing to the naïve and humbling for those with eyes to see.
Death is a natural process of coming undone, organically in a very literal sense.
Scripture reminds us that Jesus repeatedly raises people from the dead. He crashes funerals, and He weeps. Christ interrupts a crowd of mourners and sends away flute players, insisting that Jairus’s daughter is only sleeping. He takes her hand and tells her to get up, and the little girl opens her eyes, immediately. She begins to walk around, and Jesus instructs her parents to give her something to eat (Matthew 9:22–25). Christ is always meeting us in the middle of our humanity, addressing the most practical of needs. A twelve-year-old girl comes back from the dead, and the first thing He does is insist on a snack! That’s the God I believe in.
When Jesus hears that Lazarus is dead, He cries and wants to see His friend’s body. Martha is worried about the state of her brother’s decomposition, and she says to Jesus, “Lord, already there is a stench because he has been dead four days” (John 11:28–44). I love that Jesus is not uncomfortable with a human body being what it is. He is not dissuaded by the smell of saints. Instead, Jesus tells Lazarus to come out of his tomb, and that’s all it takes to see a dead man walking again.
Christ is always meeting us in the middle of our humanity, addressing the most practical of needs.
Death has this convincing manner of making space. It bends time, disregards the best of plans, and halts the world in one breath—or lack of it. Death makes room for itself without apology. It is the reason why we observe Lent. Ash Wednesday gestures towards our dying. We remember that we are dust and to dust we will indeed return. This is the season of memento mori. Tradition calls us to contemplate our dying and therein reconcile with our living in ways that make us ready for resurrection. Easter is therefore a reminder that death is not an empty threat; it is a promise kept.
This time of year, I take heart in believing that even God died.
He was buried by those who believed in Him. Someone had to plead to Pilate for the body of Christ. Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus (John 19: 38–42) wrapped the Son of God in myrrh and strips of linen, observing Jewish burial ritual. It was women in Scripture who were the ones that wanted to tend to Jesus post-mortem. (Luke 24: 1–7). These faithful women brought their spices and tender devotion to a tomb that they expected would naturally seem more putrid than pious. Their gesture of care elucidates a strength of courage that is equal parts fierce and feminine. I believe we are all called to be like these women. Unafraid to go find the Resurrection. Prepared to serve and die to the pleasantries that make reality more palatable. These women were looking for Life among the dead, and they found Him. They were neither shaken nor shy about a human body being human. Their rituals and aromatics were intended to make that tomb suitable, but it was their love that rendered it sacred. Nothing is more serious than a grave.
But it was Love that died and rose again.
Easter is a reminder that death is not an empty threat.
It is a promise kept.
Thanks be to God.
He is risen.
Alleluia.
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Azucena “Ceni” De La Torre, Polaris Program Coordinator
Ceni works closely to implement the Polaris Fellowship, supporting cohorts through a year-long leadership acceleration program. She has worked in parish and university ministries, directed retreats, and lived as a residential rector. She presented a TEDx Talk, “The Unexpected Gift of Death,” an exploration of the ways grief grants us the blessing of sameness. She holds a BA from DePaul University and earned her MTS at Duke Divinity School. She is a graduate of Worsham College of Mortuary Science. Ceni is a community-builder, steadfast encourager, an advocate for young adults navigating life in ministry, and a Catholic laywoman intentionally dedicated to ecumenical collaboration. She lives and writes in Chicago.