Do you fear Death?

  • Thread starter Thread starter BrunoMaria
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
I don’t fear death, however now enjoying life and wish to live to be 100 years in good health as an active Roman Catholic. I believe that God is all loving and that if we’ve lived our lives according to His Commandments, practicing His Beatitudes and avoiding the seven deadly sins, also having confessed and repented for our sins, He’ll reward us with acceptance into Heaven, where we’ll experience the presence of God and presence in spirit of our loved ones and relatives who have predeceased us.
 
Every morning when I awake the first thought that comes to mind is, “Dang, I’m still here, stuck in this miserable and corrupt body!”
 
Robert_Sock said:
Every morning when I awake the first thought that comes to mind is, “Dang, I’m still here, stuck in this miserable and corrupt body!”
Click to expand...
That’s a state of mind. You should wake up every morning saying “thank-you for creating me, please give me the strength to love myself as you love me”
 
GEddie said:
Better a corruptible human body than to be nobody!

ICXC NIKA.
Click to expand...
"The death of the just: Death will reach everyone, the good and the bad; but the destiny of each one is quite different. The just man sees himself in this valley of tears as a prisoner, serving a very hard term. He considers himself a slave in this world, suffering an extremely distressing servitude. He regards himself a sailor caught in a horrible storm. And as death means an end of his confinement, an end of his slavery, and is the port of his salvation, he ceases not to cry with David, ‘Woe is me that my sojourning is prolonged!’ (Ps. 119:5)… He ceases not to ask with the Apostle’… Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? (Rom. 7:24)”
-The Golden Key to Heaven, by Saint Anthony Mary Claret
 
ChainBreaker said:
So… you fear death because you will lose something you value as good.
Click to expand...
Although I hope to continue living for a much longer time, I don’t actually “fear” death whenever that time will come. Although I would have some regrets leaving behind friends, family and what’s good in this world that I know, I’m not “afraid” of the hereafter. Having faith, trust and hope in God, our Creator who made us and all that is, I’d go in confidence to whatever in His love He has planned for me and what I strive for: Heaven, maybe a short (hopefully short) term in Purgatory.
 
Emerite said:
Although I hope to continue living for a much longer time, I don’t actually “fear” death whenever that time will come. Although I would have some regrets leaving behind friends, family and what’s good in this world that I know, I’m not “afraid” of the hereafter. Having faith, trust and hope in God, our Creator who made us and all that is, I’d go in confidence to whatever in His love He has planned for me and what I strive for: Heaven, maybe a short (hopefully short) term in Purgatory.
Click to expand...
So if a Nazi had a gun held to your head and said “don’t worry, you are not going to feel a thing”, you wouldn’t at all have feelings of fear?
 
Robert_Sock said:
"The death of the just: Death will reach everyone, the good and the bad; but the destiny of each one is quite different. The just man sees himself in this valley of tears as a prisoner, serving a very hard term. He considers himself a slave in this world, suffering an extremely distressing servitude. He regards himself a sailor caught in a horrible storm. And as death means an end of his confinement, an end of his slavery, and is the port of his salvation, he ceases not to cry with David, ‘Woe is me that my sojourning is prolonged!’ (Ps. 119:5)… He ceases not to ask with the Apostle’… Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? (Rom. 7:24)”
-The Golden Key to Heaven, by Saint Anthony Mary Claret
Click to expand...
I still struggle to fathom why bodily aliveness is so repulsive to you, RS…

ICXC NIKA.
 
GEddie said:
I still struggle to fathom why bodily aliveness is so repulsive to you, RS…

ICXC NIKA.
Click to expand...
These bodies are far from what our glorious bodies will be. These bodies cause us to sin due to carnal pleasures. Putting things into proper perspective, this life is miserable and corrupt, yet their are many, maybe the majority, who love this life so much that they would live here throughout eternity, caring nothing about the Kingdom of God.
 
I’m not sure if I fear death or not, but something St. Therese wrote about in a Story of a Soul (bolded below) is unsettling to me. In fact, it gives me the chills. On the night between Holy Thursday and Good Friday1896, she experienced her first hemoptysis (spitting up of blood). This was the first sign of the illness that would eventually lead to her death some eighteen months later. She welcomed this event as a mysterious visitation of the “Divine Spouse”. As she herself described it; “On Good Friday, Jesus wished to give me the hope of going to see Him in heaven.” But by Easter Sunday a thick fog (darkness) enveloped her soul. She pretty much kept this hidden and to herself. This darkness stayed with her right up to the end. Shortly before her death she described to her sister Pauline (Sr. Agnes of Jesus) this darkness which invaded her soul;
Jesus permitted my soul to be invaded by the thickest darkness, and that the thought of heaven, up until then so sweet to me, be no longer anything but the cause of struggle and torment. This trial was to last not a few days or a few weeks, it was not to be extinguished until the hour set by God Himself and this hour has not yet come. I would like to be able to express what I feel, but alas! I believe this is impossible. One would have to travel through this dark tunnel to understand this darkness…
Click to expand...
Then suddenly the fog that surrounds me becomes more dense; it penetrates my soul and envelops it in such a way that it is impossible to discover within it the sweet image of my Fatherland; everything has disappeared! When I want to rest my heart fatigued by the darkness which surrounds it by the memory of the luminous country after which I aspire, my torment redoubles; ***it seems to me that the darkness, borrowing the voice of sinners, says mockingly to me: “You are dreaming about the light, about a fatherland embalmed in the sweetest perfumes; you are dreaming about the eternal possession of the Creator of all these marvels; you believe that one day you will walk out of this fog which surrounds you! Advance, advance; rejoice in death which will give you not what you hope for, but a night still more profound, the night of nothingness.” ***
Click to expand...
Peace, Mark
 
ChainBreaker said:
So if a Nazi had a gun held to your head and said “don’t worry, you are not going to feel a thing”, you wouldn’t at all have feelings of fear?
Click to expand...
As that is a particularly hideous death (and death by nature is hideous) methinks even those otherwise unafraid of death would be horrified!

ICXC NIKA
 
classicar said:
Only if I am carrying an unconfessed and unabsolved mortal sin do I fear death, because life is complicated out there, and I might die before I can get to the confessional. The sanctifying Grace of the shed Blood of Jesus is enough to take the FEAR of death away from me, because Jesus says Himself that under these conditions, (the sanctifying Grace of His shed Blood)“even though we die, so shall we live”.(John 11:25)
Praise the Lord for His fabulous Sacrifice that frees us from the fear of death, but casts the fear out because of His perfect Love. Classicar.
Click to expand...
I said the same thing in post #5…in not as many words.
 
Emerite said:
Although …I would have some regrets leaving behind … what’s good in this world
Click to expand...
The one and only thing we really ought to fear, is if we appear to God’s feast in a clean gown. For otherwise the King will say as in Mt 22,12 …‘Friend, how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ …… ‘Tie him up hand and foot and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth!’ For many are called, but few are chosen.”

And let’s remember Joh 12,25: The one who loves his life, destroys it, but the one who disregards his life in this world, guards it for eternal life. And further; St. Paul who cited Isaiah 64,3 in 1Cor 2,9: “Things that no eye has seen, or ear heard, or mind imagined, are the things God has prepared for those who love Him.”

Our temporary life here, is but a probation for our eternal and real life in God’s Kingdom. Why should we stick to the temporary probation?!

Yours
Bruno
 
ChainBreaker said:
So if a Nazi had a gun held to your head and said “don’t worry, you are not going to feel a thing”, you wouldn’t at all have feelings of fear?
Click to expand...
I wouldn’t compare God to a Nazi. Dying is a natural part of life, being assassinated by an enemy with a gun to my head is unnatural and would be something to fear. One should respect life from conception to “natural” death. And I would offer any suffering upon death, if not alleviated by pain medicine, as atonement. Jesus Christ suffered upon his death on the crucifix, even asking God to forgive his assassins for “they know not what they do.”
 
Emerite said:
I wouldn’t compare God to a Nazi. Dying is a natural part of life, being assassinated by an enemy with a gun to my head is unnatural and would be something to fear. One should respect life from conception to “natural” death. And I would offer any suffering upon death, if not alleviated by pain medicine, as atonement. Jesus Christ suffered upon his death on the crucifix, even asking God to forgive his assassins for “they know not what they do.”
Click to expand...
Anybody who is not totally horrified by the idea of death is adept in the art of self-kidding, IMNAAHO.
 
GEddie said:
Anybody who is not totally horrified by the idea of death is adept in the art of self-kidding, IMNAAHO.
Click to expand...
I do have a slight fear of the unknown, upon dying. The Apocalypse might not be a fun thing to experience, except for God’s promises to those who are faithful to Him. But I’m not totally horrified because of all that I’ve learned from studying the Bible and because of my faith in God. Do you all not think that God is all loving? If one is fearful of death because of His punishment, now might be the time to get his or her lives in order to be right with God and maybe have less fear of death.
 
Emerite said:
I do have a slight fear of the unknown, upon dying. The Apocalypse might not be a fun thing to experience, except for God’s promises to those who are faithful to Him. But I’m not totally horrified because of all that I’ve learned from studying the Bible and because of my faith in God. Do you all not think that God is all loving? If one is fearful of death because of His punishment, now might be the time to get his or her lives in order to be right with God and maybe have less fear of death.
Click to expand...
It is in your nature to fear death, for it is your nature to live and survive. Knowledge of the good news may bring some sense of comfort to the idea of death, but it does not change our nature. If you didn’t fear death, you would walk into dangerous situations without thinking.

I do not think you are being entirely honest. You have gone from “I don’t fear death” to “oh no! The Nazi has strapped a live grenade to my groin so now I have a slight fear of death!”

😃
 
ChainBreaker said:
It is in your nature to fear death, for it is your nature to live and survive. Knowledge of the good news may bring some sense of comfort to the idea of death, but it does not change our nature. If you didn’t fear death, you would walk into dangerous situations without thinking.

I do not think you are being entirely honest. You have gone from “I don’t fear death” to “oh no! The Nazi has strapped a live grenade to my groin so now I have a slight fear of death!”

😃
Click to expand...
I would fear the terrible action and pain of an unnatural death by a Nazi violently killing me, but wouldn’t fear God calling me to death in a natural way, which is God’s plan for all of us. It would be the condition of one’s death to be considered. Maybe it takes a true Christian to understand this difference.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top