If you know me, you know that I tend to be blunt.  Awkwardly so.

Being that blunt objects aren’t allowed at funerals, I’ve had to learn the art of professional speak.  Professional speak in the funeral business is the art of saying what you want to say without really saying it.

Situation Number 1:

Blunt Caleb:  “When we picked your dad up from the nursing home, he was looking all purple and reddish, but after we embalmed him, we were able to flush the discoloration out of his face.”

Professional speak, “Your dad looks great.”

Situation Number 2:

Blunt Caleb: “Do you want that beard shaved off your mom’s face?”

Professional speak Caleb ignores asking that question all together and just shaves mom’s face.

Americans — maybe even Westerns as a whole — are impatient.  We rarely have quiet.  The TV’s constantly on.  Our smart phones are ever at our side.   Ear buds in our ears.  Meditation is a foreign concept.  Prayer is avoidable at all costs.  And the patience learned in the silence is never attained.  And then comes death and the silence that comes with it.  The meditation.  The prayer.  The lack of words.  And when the results of grief work don’t come immediately, we become impatient and think, “Something is dreadfully wrong with me!”  And we’re right.  We usually conclude that we’re deeply depressed; the reality may simply be that we’re deeply and intrinsically impatient, unable to find the peace in the silence that comes from death.  Maybe we’re just as afraid of the silence as we are of death.

Death brings its own pace of life … its own schedule.  It’s never convenient.  But we want it to be.  We want to control it.  We want to put it on an itinerary that fits our fast paced, purpose driven lifestyles.

Perhaps that battle for control is nowhere more apparent than at a viewing, especially when the viewing line mimics the slow moving, long lines we see at a popular amusement park ride.

This past Saturday night, I stood there behind the register book, striking up conversation with people as they enter the sanctuary.  The viewing line snakes around the church, down the hall and into the basement as we try to extend it through the corridors of the church so as to keep the line from going out into the cold elements of a Pennsylvania winter.  The family of the deceased is taking their time, talking to each and every person who has come out on this chilly night.

“Other funeral directors stand by the family’s receiving line and tell them to keep their conversations short and simply”, one person stated.

“We don’t do that”, I said politely.

Another couple comes through the line and complains that they’ve been standing in line for half-an-hour AND by the look of things, they’ll probably be in line for another half-an-hour.  “Can’t you do anything?”  they beg.

I try to make a joke … I tell them that, like Disney World, we are going to create an express line, where you can bypass the crowd for a fee.  “That’s a great idea”, they say.  “We’d pay $50 to skip this line.”

After having this conversation about 10 times over the next hour, I’m getting tired of my joke and I’m getting tired of people complaining.

I want to grab their dress shirts, pull them nose to nose with my face and whisper, “This isn’t about you.”  But that would be blunt Caleb speaking and that Caleb isn’t allowed around death.

Perhaps the greatest loss that comes with the drone of our busy lives is that in losing silence, we’ve lost patience, and in losing patience we’ve become so inherently selfish that when we go to a funeral we forget that it’s not about us.

Have you created a will?

Have you assigned an executor of your will?

Have you designated a beneficiary of your estate?

If you haven’t, that’s (sorta) okay because – by default — there is a legal (with emphasis on legal) next-of-kin (NOK). [1]

For married couples, one’s spouse is the legal NOK upon death, unless an Executor has been designated.

We saw this “legal NOK” play out on a public level with the death of Mary Kennedy.  Even though Mary’s husband Robert was estranged, had filed for divorce and was living with his girlfriend, his legal status as “husband” confirmed him as the decision maker for Mary’s disposition, funeral and estate.

Mary’s family, recognizing the fact that Robert was possibly the least qualified to respect Mary’s wishes, sued for said rights of disposition.  They lost.  Sure, they had more affection for Mary.  Sure, they had loved Mary better than Robert.  Sure, Robert was probably the main influence in Mary’s suicide.

Unfortunately, though, the people who loved Mary the best in life were unable to do so in death. While the the legal process of designating a NOK in the absence of an Executor works most of the time, in Mary’s case it didn’t.

And this brings us to gay rights in death.

The latest statistics I’ve read show that half of Americas support gay marriage while the other half do not.  It’s a divisive and complex discussion that touches anthropology, sociology, psychology, politics, genetics, gender and sexuality, philosophy and theology.  I know this is a contentious conversation and I usually don’t touch bruised topics unless they involve Mark Driscoll.

But, being that few have looked at gay rights from the perspective of thanatology (the study of death and dying), I thought I’d give it a stab. From a thanatological perspective, this issue seems to be less determined by whether or not one agrees with gay marriage or civil unions and more to do with who can best honor the deceased in death.

In the Kennedy case, Mary could have legally designated an Executor of her estate before she died.  This would have taken away Robert’s default NOK rights and placed them to the designated Executor.  The problem was this: she didn’t designate an Executor.

While I’m sure committed gay couples — recognizing that many states don’t affirm their unions — will often set up their partner as an Executor, the case of Mary Kennedy shows that not everyone has a binding will that designates their Executor … even when they SHOULD have a binding will.

I’m sure there’s cases that exist right now where a gay couple has been together for a couple decades and haven’t set up a will or designated their partner as the executor.  And, I’m sure, like the Kennedy case, the legal NOK (the parents or possibly children), may attempt to ostracize those that really loved the deceased the best.

And yes, Robert ostracized Mary’s family from having any part in the service.

What happens when a gay committed couple hasn’t designated their partner as the executor?

What happens when the parents so disapprove of the gay relationship that — like Robert did with Mary’s family — the legal NOK ostracizes the partner who had been with the deceased for decades?

When does the Christian church’s hunger for being Biblical and right become cruelty?

Should the church support denying somebody the ability to properly grieve?

You may be personally opposed to the state granting gay couples the right to marry (and I do realize that the issue at hand is much larger than simply whether or not the state should affirm gay marriage), but it seems that denying a couple the ability to care and take care of their partner in death creates the kind of drama and difficulty that was recently on display in the death of Mary Kennedy.

10.  Oscar Wilde.  Love the lip marks on his grave.

9.  Bruce Lee.

8.  Mark Twain.

7.  Frank Sinatra.

6.  Princes Diana.  The prettiest grave of them all.

5.  Marilyn Monroe.

4.  Jim Morrison.

3.  Elvis Presley.

2.  Shakespeare.

1.  Michael Jackson.

I have a couple problems with Top Tenz’s list.  Michael Jackson at number one?  Really?  I’d put Princess Diana before Jackson.

I might also switch up Monroe and Morrison, but my real problem isn’t with the order of the list … my main problem is with the list per se.

There’s a lot of huge names that they’re leaving off.

Like Jesus Christ.  I know, he’s risen … but his grave is supposedly sheltered in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre and yearly receives thousands and thousands of visitors.  What about Muhammad’s grave in the city of Medina in Saudi Arabia … a grave that gets millions of visits a year as pilgrims travel to Mecca.

What about Vlad Lenin, John Lennon, Hendrix, JFK?

And I’m sure there’s dark horse candidates from Asia, South America and Africa that our Western-centric sensibilities don’t even know about.

WHO DO YOU THINK MAKES THE TOP 10 LIST???

Ash Wednesday isn’t suppose to be comfortable.  It’s a day when the church takes repentance public.  A day when something we usually reserve for the private sphere get’s pushed into the public sphere.  It’s a day when repentance becomes corporate.  When repentance is there for all to see, with the sign of the cross inscribed in ash on our foreheads.

And it’s not just a time of repentance, but it’s also a time of relinquishment … relinquishment of our project of immortality.

As I wrote earlier this week:

Denial of death, for Pulitzer Prize winner Ernest Becker, is an all encompassing explanation for human endeavors.

Death, though, for Becker has two levels of meaning: The first level is phyiscal death.  After all, how many times a day do we attempt to distance ourselves from death?  Do you eat healthy?  Do you wear a seat belt?

The second understanding of death plays more into our discussion.  This type of death can occur during life. It’s the type of death that takes place when we experience a loss of meaning, worth or affirmation.  And this type of death, though it will happen eventually for us all, is what most of us work so hard to deny.

Ash Wednesday is an acknowledgement of Ernest Becker’s second type of death.  It’s an acknowledgement of our mortality; an acknowledge of our finitude; and an acknowledge of our depravity.

It’s the day we repent for our denial of death. Essentially, it’s a day when we prove Ernest Becker wrong.

It does us good to remember the old saying that is found on some tombstones:

Remember friends as you pass by,
as you are now so once was I.
As I am now so you must be.
Prepare for death and follow me.

It’s good for us to remember that the works of our hands will not last forever.  That our kingdoms will fall.  That America will one day be no more. That our bodies will die.  That our jobs, our business, our children, our name, our political ideals, and even our religion will one day — if they are lucky — find themselves in the annuls of history.  That even our Christianity as we know it will one day be rendered dead.

And maybe this type of doubt is the reason few evangelicals partake in Ash Wednesday.  After all, we have fervently engaged in the project of death denial as we’ve built theological buildings that we believe will last for time eternal.

And maybe it’s right to even press this farther.

Maybe Ash Wednesday is a day when the church should allow ourselves to doubt in the life after this one. That maybe our hopes of heaven are misinterpretations of Jesus’ words.  That maybe all we have is today to love and be loved.  And maybe, in forgetting this next life, we might strive for life now. We might find eternal life before our death.

Ash Wednesday isn’t suppose to be comfortable.  No, there’s nothing comfortable about this day.

“From dust you were made and to dust you shall return.”  – Genesis 3:19

Knowing that Mars Hills is apt to take legal action … like when they sent a “Cease and Desist” letter to a “Mars Hill Church” in Sacramento claiming copyright infringement (they did eventually back down when the public outcry hurt their PR).

So — remembering said legal action —  I put this disclaimer up:

CONTENT DISCLAIMER: As per the direct advice of Mars Hill PR, I am to inform you that this post is fictitious and DOES NOT represent the views or opinions of Mark Driscoll. However, the content of this post is based off Caleb Wilde’s exaggerated interpretation of Mark’s recent radio interview with the British radio program “Unbelievable”.

Honestly, I pity Mark Driscoll’s PR guy.

He seems like a genuinely nice guy … a guy I’d gladly share a conversation and some coffee with, but I can’t think of a more difficult job?

Political parties vet their representatives and we as Christians are the representatives of the Kingdom of God, so why don’t we do the same? We do, actually.  We do it bunches.  Especially after church.

So let’s find a way to do it in church.  We’ve been smart enough to have ecumenical creeds for our doctrines, I suggest it’s high time we settle on a unified vetting process to save the Church from all loser, fail and stupid “Christians”.

In the spirit of Jesus’ Public Relations and for the furtherance of unity in the body of Christ, I thought I would attempt to make an Ecumenical Vetting Process to determine WHEN new believers can go public with their Christian.

1.) In order to call yourself a Christian in Western civilization you must be able to update your Facebook status with proper grammar and decent syntax. He doesn’t want you making Him look dumb.

If you don’t have the MDiv., you propably shouldn’t speak publicly about your interpretation of scripture.  Jesus invites you to less important tasks in the church like ushering, organizing potlucks, leading youth group and / or leading worship.

2.) In order to call yourself a Christian, you MUST have a firm grasp on ALL verbiage that is considered “politically correct.”  Remember W.W.J.D. and W.W.N.P.S. (What would Nancy Pelosi say).

3.) You MUST be somewhat attractive. Jesus isn’t sold on the “Attraction Model” of church growth, but he does like his people to be well groomed and as handsome and/or pretty and/or metro as they possibly can be.  The Sampson look was so B.C.  Think Mitt Romney.

4.) You CANNOT be the author of cheesy music, be the artist of horrible art, be the poet of sappy “Christian” poems or have any type of cheesiness. Jesus likes cheese with His wine, but he doesn’t like cheesy with his Christians.

5.) You must be a VERBAL pacifist. Now, secretly, we all know Jesus likes to throw it down now and again, but you can’t let the world know this. No warmongering, hate speech allowed.

6.)  You must live an ENTIRELY morally pure life as defined by everybody else’s standards. That’s right.  Not only does Jesus want you to live by HIS standards, he also wants you to live by EVERYBODY else’s as well. Sound impossible? If it does, maybe you’re not cut for the esteemed title of “Christian.”

7.)  Finally, if you’re going to call yourself a Christian, you should NOT watch, listen or like Lady Gaga.  Jesus used to like weird outcasts, but he’s gotten over them and now prefers the in crowd of normal people.

If you do all of the above, Jesus will let you call yourself a “Christian.”

Maybe if we get enough people who can pass this vetting, we can redeem the name “Christian” and rid ourselves of the monikers of being “dumb”, “uneducated”, “ungracious”, “ugly”, “cheesy”, “uncreative” and “hypocritical.”  You know, we’ll be perfect … just like the 12 disciples.

Finally, you can bypass the whole vetting process if you simply decide to give loads of money to the Republican Party.

*****

Being that this is an ecumenical vetting process, I’m sure my point of view doesn’t capture the entire picture.

What did I miss?

We will honor and welcome the spirits of our deceased loved ones by gathering together with our very-much-still-alive loved ones for the next two or three days.

Together, we’ll celebrate by building ofrendas. And on these ofrendas we’ll place items that remind us of our lost friends and relatives.  We’ll honor their memory with our memories of their lives as we sit around our houses, play cards, play games, listen to music and reminisce about times past.

In fact, we’ll celebrate so richly, with so many people, so many games, so much food and so many colorful decorations that we’ll spend two months worth of our yearly income on our feasts with family and friends.

We’ll celebrate so fully, so genuinely in remembering the dead that we’ll create life.

And we’d do all of this if we lived in Mexico and celebrated Dia de los Muetros, the Day of the Dead.

****

Actually, though, if we (as the enlightened of the first world) lived in Mexico we’d probably condemn the whole national holiday as naive, bordering sinful.

1.)  We’d condemn the fact that venerating the dead is a plight of the third-world amalgamation between supernaturalism and the occult.

2.)  We’d joke about the stupidity of spending two months of your income on three days of partying.  How prodigious.

3.)  The evangelicals would remind those ignorant Mexicans that the spirits of the dead are either in heaven or hell, and can’t *really* come back to earth for a short vacation … in fact, anything that does come back is probably demonic.

4.)  Or, if we were a religious materialist, we’d poke fun at the whole antiquated idea of spirits, the afterlife and their supposed visitation of us.

5.)  And then we’d condemn the whole holiday and everyone who participated in it.

But, I really wonder if this holiday is all bad?

*****

Sure, it’s not healthy to look at the dead as needing appeasement via food offerings, etc.  Neither is it healthy to worship the deceased (in which case, funeral directors would be priests?).

But, I think the Mexican’s relationship to death is healthier than the Wests.

Here, we internalize our memories, hardly ever sharing and never remembering in a corporate setting.

Here, we mourn silently, never recognizing that in some way, in some capacity, whether literally or figuratively, the dead still dwell with us.  That in us — in the present state of all humanity — lays the heritage of humanity’s past.  In you, the reality of the past is still very much present.  But in the West, we ignore that presence of the past, where in Mexico its celebrated.

Sure, maybe some of the practices on The Day of the Dead are worthy of condemnation.  But, not celebrating, not remembering, not joining together in a corporate setting to conjure up the lives of old … not doing these things condemns our future.

*****

Over the next couple days, I want to join with the hundreds of millions around the world and solemnly celebrate both All Saints Day (Nov. 1) and All Souls Days (Nov. 2).  Unless you’re Catholic, these religious holidays might not be familiar to you.  But they underscore a healthy relationship to the past that most of us have both neglected and forgotten.

And, in the spirit of joining in this Mexican holiday, and in anticipating the beginning of a small, but intentional solemn celebration here at my blog over the next two days, I have two questions for you: in what ways do the spirits of your past friends and relatives dwell with you?  What heritage have they left you that lives on in you today?

]]> http://www.calebwilde.com/2011/10/celebrating-dia-de-los-muertos/feed/ 3 http://www.calebwilde.com/2011/10/does-god-rejoice-in-gaddafis-death/ http://www.calebwilde.com/2011/10/does-god-rejoice-in-gaddafis-death/#comments Wed, 26 Oct 2011 14:06:46 +0000 Caleb Wilde http://www.calebwilde.com/?p=2737 A couple years ago we buried a young man who died from an overdose.

And while the death from overdose probably wasn’t slow, the process leading to the death was.

He started using in middle school and his addiction continued on to his death at 25 years of age.

Everyone expected it, including his mother.

Most of the funerals we have for drug users are very somber.  Most have an air of self-reflection.  One segment of the funeral goers have a guilt that asks, “what could I have done to prevent this?” … of wondering what could have been.  Another part of the attendees are his friends, many of whom are also users, who are wondering, “This could have been me … it will be me ….”

But this funeral was different.

In place of heaviness, there was buoyancy … a buoyancy that started with the person who usually carries the bulk of the ‘what could I have done to prevent this?” heaviness.

It came from his mom.

I for one couldn’t understand why she was so content, so I asked her and her answer still haunts me.

She said, “Do you know how many sleepless nights we stayed awake worrying about our son?  Do you know how many people hurt for him and how many people he hurt?  This addiction just wouldn’t go away.  There are worse things than death.”

****

So, being the believer that I am, I’ve been wondering, “Is God  – like the mother of this young man — ever contented in death?”

This question has been both weighty and practical as I’ve considered the death of Gaddafi.

As I’ve considered this question, I realize that God is love.

And I’ve also realized that our view of God’s love is so white.

It’s so nice.  And proper.  And happy.

A product of middle to upper class sensibilities and emotional luxuries.

A product of our severe lack of abuse, our lack of being exploited, of being used.

Many of us – and I include myself in “us” — only have a conceptualization of evil that lacks experience.  We look at the Old Testament and we’re disgusted by the prayers of King David.  We’re disgusted by the wars, the deaths.

Why?

Because our view of life is vanilla, un-darkened by the stains of pain and blood.

Sheltered from the evils and injustices of our privileged perspective, we have defined love from middle class, white sensibilities.

And we’ve come to have such a fuzzy view of goodness that we simply can’t understand what it’s like to have our whole family brutally raped, killed, and then dismembered by the crazed foot soldiers of a purely satanic megalomaniacal tyrant.

Gaddafi was a tyrant … a tyrant who had an addiction to power that wasn’t going away.

****

Do the likes of Gaddafi cause God to “stay awake at night”, worrying about what he’s going to do, who he’s going to maim, kill or destroy?

In Ezekiel chapters 18 and 33 it states that God has no pleasure in the death of the wicked.

But I wonder if he may have made an exception for Gaddafi.  Cause, there are some things worse than death.

Young woman who have lost their spouses.  Suicides.  One man whose wife was raped then murdered.  Miscarriages.  Then, there are the slow deaths from dementia / Alzheimer’s / cancer, and the limbo of wondering, “What is wrong?” as the dementia turns to anger, abuse and eventual death.

Tragedies.  All.  Darkness I’ve been privileged to feel.

Many have expressed that they’ve wrestled with the “why” that God doesn’t answer.

The “why” that expects a response.  The “why” that pastors say will one day be answered in the next life, when our perspective is clearer and our hearts are closer to God.  The “why” that some Christians claim is soothed by the soft, quiet voice of the Holy Spirit.  And others dismiss because they know with certainty that death was somehow “God’s will.”

Yet, for many believers, and nonbelievers, the answer to this why cannot hold out to the next life.  For too many this “why” is answered, not by the soft, quiet voice of the Spirit, but by the darkness of silence.

A “why” that is only multiplied by silence.  A “why” that grows into disbelief and continues to be solidified by the silence that started it.

*****

The other week we held the funeral for a 50 year old that was killed in a motorcycle accident at our funeral home.

What made this particular situation more tragic wasn’t just the way he died, but the fact that he left his wife, young son and even his father behind.

As I was parking the family vehicles in the procession line, I spoke with the deceased’s mother-in-law for about 10 minutes.

She wanted to talk and I wanted to listen.

She explained to me that, as there were no witnesses to the accident, the theory is that he lost control of his cycle as a result of a deer jumping out in front of him, causing him to attempt an evasive maneuver and lose control of his cycle.

The mother-in-law explained that nobody knows for sure a deer caused him to lose control – as there were no witnesses — but given his superior riding ability, his familiarity with the specific road he was on, and the fact that there were skid marks at the place of his accident all seem to support the theory that he was lost control while attempting to avoid something … that something probably being a deer.

Unknown and unexplainable deaths can often lead to a grey and confusing grief.  I’ve noticed that grief works its way through a person in a slightly healthier manner when it has some explanation, but when there isn’t an explanation … it just sits like a morning fog.

*****

The forever question of “How did he die?” was answered not with a “real” answer, but with an answer that sufficed … that somehow made the grief that would otherwise be grey and confusing into something something slightly more healthy.  It was an answer that we “imagined” from the best evidence we could supply.  An answer from our own imaginations.

And I wonder how often the heavy “whys” of death and God aren’t just answered by our own imaginations.  I wonder how often we simply speculate based on our knowledge that God is good, that death is bad, the man is somewhat free to mess up … that s*** happens.  And after convincing ourselves numerous times over, we simply come to believe that our imagined answer is “the truth.”

The silence to the “why” is so maddening that we just fill it with answers of our own making.

It’s convenient.

It’s easy.

It works.

And maybe it’s somehow healthy for us.

And then I wonder if the silence to our “why” might just be due to the fact that God has no answer.  Maybe he’s not there at all.  Or, maybe we’re asking a question that’s inspired by something that has no response.

Just the other day I was sitting with a young man who has been marginalized on a number of fronts due to his economic status and his disabling lack of kidneys.   His three times a week dialysis, coupled with a lack of transportation, keeps him from being employable.  On top of that his girlfriend just found out she’s pregnant to another man.

He was telling me that his spirit’s broken.   No hope.

And he says, “It is what it is.”

I hate that saying.  For a young man like this, it’s the white flag of surrender.  It says, “My life will never be any better than what it is.”  And with that attitude, it won’t.

It’d be easy for me to respond, “Stop saying, ‘It is what it is’ and start saying, ‘it will be what I make it’ … start believing you can take control of your future.” And that’s the positive side to believing in a libertarian free will … that you, no matter what your situation, can find a way to overcome.  Especially, when you factor God and his Church into the equation.

It’s easy for me as a privileged white man to say, “Just take your world by the horns … get a job, find some self-respect.” And while acknowledging nature and nurture aren’t causative, it’s also vital to acknowledge that being dealt a bad hand limits options, and can, in some areas, take away both the freedom and the will to move on.

*****

Bullying is another thing that limits the will.

This past week, Jamey Rodemeyer committed suicide.  He was 14 years old. He was also gay.

Stuff like this was posted on one of Jamey’s social media pages,

“JAMIE IS STUPID, GAY, FAT AND [sic] UGLY. HE MUST DIE!”

And another:

“I wouldn’t care if you died. No one would. So just do it It would make everyone WAY more happier!”

Apparently, according to his friends and mother, he had been made fun of for years.  And, he had been told, by a number of his class mates that he was going straight to hell.

He was ONLY 14 years old.

But, this isn’t new.  According to a Rutgers report, roughly 20% of gay kids attempt suicide compared to only 5% of straight kids.

In response to Jamey’s suicide, Lady Gaga (who I’ve been writing about a lot of late), wrote:

“The past days I’ve spent reflecting, crying, and yelling. I have so much anger. It is hard to feel love when cruelty takes someone’s life….Bullying must become illegal. It is a hate crime. I am meeting with our President. I will not stop fighting. This must end. Our generation has the power to end it. Trend it #MakeALawForJamey.”

I work with youth at a type of Boys and Girls club called “The Parkesburg Point” (which is where I met the young man with no kidneys).  Bullying is real.  And it really messes a kid up.  Gay or not.  And while bullying has been taking place ever since one child was shorter than the rest, cyber space has created a forum that takes bullying those who are different to a whole different level.

In fact, we don’t allow cell phones at “The Parkesburg Point” for that very reason.  We’re afraid that someone would use their cell phone’s camera to take a compromising photo of another youth, edit the photo to make it look worse, post it on facebook only to have the photo grow viral and the bullying grow exponentially.

And I know there’s agendas and associations from the political right and the left whenever the term “hate crime” is brought up.  Everybody’s afraid that their rights are being violated.  But, I think cases like this should make us realize that free speech and bullying aren’t the same thing … that bullying a different child to the point of death is different than disagreeing with a particular lifestyle.

*****

Bullying breaks the spirit.  It effectively takes away both freedom and the will to live.  It takes away worth.  It takes away the future.  It creates death.   And in some ways, creates what appears to be “a suicide” into murder.

In Jamey’s case, the police are opening a criminal investigation and supposedly are determining whether or not they will charge three particular boys with some form of harassment, hate crime or cyber harassement.

Malcolm Lazin, founder and executive director of the Equality Forum, states concerning gay bullying,

“They are bullied and marginalized. While some may say that Jamey took his life, it is unrelenting homophobia that murdered him.”

On a death certificate, there’s a place for the doctor to mark the manner of a person’s death .  The manner can either be “Natural”, “Accidental”, “Homicide”, “Suicide”, “Pending” or “Could Not be Determined”.  And if I were a doctor, I’d be tempted to put my “X” in between the boxes for “homicide” and “suicide.”

I believe that Jamey took his own life.  By his own 14 year old hand.  I believe it was suicide.  I also believe that he wouldn’t have done it had he been treated with more love and respect by his peers.  And I believe the freedom of his will was greatly damaged by the hurtful words of others.

So was this murder or suicide?  I think the lines are blurred.