Ken A. Bryson
Christians celebrate the birth of Christ at this time of year, but how can the spirit of Christmas appeal to a culturally diverse population, and how is the attraction maintained year round?
A plaque on my desk reads, ‘Have a good day unless you’ve made other plans.’ So, I strive to fill my day with the Christmas spirit of love, compassion, forgiveness, and kindness unless I make other plans.
This reality is brought home in my classes on death and dying. I have been teaching courses on this subject since the early seventies. One of our first exercises is to face the possibility of our very own death.
Everyone knows ‘they die someday’ but can we translate that impersonal claim into an affirmation of our personal death? I invite my students to draft the list of the order of deaths in the classroom. Most will put their name towards the bottom of the list. They think that death happens to others.
I train students to be radical thinkers and remind them that they too must die someday. Once born, it’s already too late because we begin to die. To make it easier to face the possibility of personal death, I sentence them to die in 18 hours, usually around 5 a.m. (when blood sugar levels are low), not because I dislike students but because this is a philosophy course and we do that sort of thing.
To add insult to injury I give them their first assignment in which they record (i) what they do with the next 18 hours, (ii) how they die, and (iii) write their obituary (as they want it read in the newspaper).
I find a lot of humor and denial in all three parts of the assignment. The denial of personal death is commonplace. One student dies while making love to some lucky lady, no doubt his final gift to humanity; another completes a Ph.D. and flies to Hawaii to be married and have children—all in 18 hours.
At this point we read parts of Tolstoy’s novel the Death of Ivan Ilyich and Heidegger’s chapter on death in his book Being and Time. This is followed by a discussion of the transformative character of Near Death Experiences.
What does this have to do with Christmas? Gradually my students realize that coming to terms with their own death functions as a source of inspiration to focus on the redemptive character of a new life.
That change of heart mirrors Christmas as a drive towards sacred spirituality. Everyday can be like Christmas, especially when I act as if I only have 18 hours left to live.
Merry Christmas everyone—unless you’ve made other plans!
Ken A. Bryson lives in Sarnia with his wife Rosalie and is Professor Emeritus at Cape Breton University.