Life and Death: A Tribute

The email’s subject was simply his name. I knew immediately what it meant. I hoped against hope that there was some other explanation for the subject to be what it was. There wasn’t.

When you get an email where the subject line is that person’s name, a person like him, there’s only one thing it can mean.

The service will be held March 14 at St. Mary’s, where the World AIDS Day prayer service was held.

I knew this day was coming. We all knew this day was coming. From the day he tested positive for the virus, he knew this day was coming.

Part of me isn’t sad at all. Part of me is glad for his sake. I can remember sitting beside him in his bed. He held my hand with his feeble, emaciated hand. With tears streaming down his cheeks, he asked, “Is this Hell, Davo? Am I living in Hell?” I remember days when his meds would be off, and he would be entirely incoherent. He would tell the same four stories over and over again until I knew them better than he did. I remember the false-alarm, deathbed moments, where I was sure that we would lose him, only to have him miraculously pull through several days later. Most of all I remember the pain and loneliness that he shamelessly displayed any time he talked about his partner. Those moments reverberate in the chasms of my soul. Because of the pain that he no longer feels, part of me is glad… for his sake.

Part of me also feels sorrow. He was there for one of the pivotal moments in my life, and he is inextricably bound to it. I learned so much from him. He was my first openly gay friend. He was the first openly HIV+ person I knew. At that point in my life, those descriptors carried more depth than their explicit meaning. He was an integral part of my journey towards a greater recognition of the inherent worth of a human being.

Naturally, he had his issues with the Church, for which I cannot blame him. Many in the Church had mistreated him, and as a result, I don’t think he put any stock in Christianity. Yet I can distinctly remember two occassions when, while visiting him in the nursing home, he told me that to him, we were Jesus. It was as if our meager actions were the beginning steps of reconciling the chasm of hurt that existed between him and the followers of Jesus.

He deeply impacted my life at a time and in a way that no one else in that moment could have. He was a brother, a friend, a fellow sojourner, family. Family.

He taught me solidarity in life. May he experience perfect communion in death.

¡Cese la represión!

The words of Óscar Romero the day before he was assassinated while performing mass:

Brothers, you came from our own people. You are killing your own brothers. Any human order to kill must be subordinate to the law of God, which says, ‘Thou shalt not kill’. No soldier is obliged to obey an order contrary to the law of God. No one has to obey an immoral law. It is high time you obeyed your consciences rather than sinful orders. The church cannot remain silent before such an abomination. …In the name of God, in the name of this suffering people whose cry rises to heaven more loudly each day, I implore you, I beg you, I order you: stop the repression!

For the past couple days, I haven’t been able to get those words out of my head: “Cese la represión.”

Saving the world and missing the point

I used to have dreams of saving the world, joining others who were leading the charge to bring humanity into a bright, new future. Those dreams came crashing down almost two years ago, and I have since been rocking in an ocean of aimlessness. It’s experiences like Kolkata that brought those dreams down. Then again, maybe the foundation was shaky to begin with. In Kolkata, with the help of a true love, perhaps I am starting to find a new foundation.

The need in Kolkata is vast, farther than the eye can see. Almost 8 million people live here. Kalighat has 50 beds for men. Mother Theresa’s work (and the ongoing work of Missionaries of Charity, which I contributed to last week) was but an ineffectual drip released from a giant reservoir of need. Maybe that’s the point. This one, whose bed I sit on and emaciated hand I stroke, matters. Forget the 8 million. All we have is 50. Forget the 50. All I have is this one.

Ironically, if everyone acted that way, perhaps we would save the world and lead humanity into a bright, new future. But again, maybe that’s missing the point.

The bottom line

I was reading Sr. Margaret M. McKenna’s writings in School(s) for Conversion: 12 Marks of a New Monasticism. She discussed the first mark of the new monasticism: relocation to the abandoned places of the empire.

“Relocation expresses conversion and commitment, the decision to resist imperial pressures and the pleasures and rewards of conformity to the way of all empires: pride, power and the reduction of all value to the bottom line.”

The “reduction of all value to the bottom line” struck me. As radical as I may be compared to Joe the Plumber, I still find myself susceptible to this method of thinking. I often still find myself using money as the ultimate standard for assigning value.

Ideas, programs and initiatives are rejected all of the time because they aren’t cost effective. They’re too expensive to be feasible. Our world operates according to a system which assigns and compares the monetary value to goods and services. The question is ultimately reduced to what the bottom line is: black or red.

My problem with this system is that money is not the only way to measure value. What if our concept of value included not only the cost of a good or service, but the quality of life of the employee who provided it? What if value included the environmental impact of providing this good or service?

The Story of Stuff outlines this concept well. Many of the goods we buy have a much greater value than the cost at which we find them in the store. To find the true worth of a good, we must consider not only its cost in the store, but cost to the standard of living for the workers in the third world who produced it and cost to the environment as natural resources were gathered and processed. Value could be computed as: $12.95 in the store + 6 workers on starvation wages working 14 hour days + 2 acres of arable land destroyed + 3 tons of carbon released into the atmosphere.

Ultimately, limiting the bottom line strictly to money is too narrow of a definition and fails to capture true worth.

Out of the ashes springs new life

A moment of reflection.

Gearing up for last summer, I knew transition would be a major element of the experience. I was transitioning out of school into a full time job. For the first time in my life, I was walking a high rope with no safety net. Did I even know what I was doing? It was challenging, but it was the only challenge I expected.

The heart-swelling pain of saying goodbye to close friends was inescapable. What I didn’t know at the beginning and couldn’t have prepared for was saying goodbye to my two best friends. I had thought they would be around for a couple years. Life is not always so kind.

There were other unexpected goodbyes and near-goodbyes that summer. Three major car accidents in one month, two of them fatal, plus Gary’s constantly precarious situation, pushed me to the limits. I was forced to let go of loved ones, close friends, fond memories. I was forced to cherish those who I was allowed to keep. I don’t like being forced into things.

Then all hell broke loose on all of us. Broken hearts, shattered dreams, unshakable doubts: we knew them all; we knew them all too well. Yet out of all that death, demise and decay, seeds of new life began to grow.

A year passed.

Life is now in full bloom.

Sara and I are engaged. I get to keep my best friend for the rest of my life. Whereas I had lost so many friends to goodbyes, I now have one whom I will never have to leave. There will be no airport, no funeral, no graduation. She is with me, and I with her for the rest of our lives.

The house has become a home. Our strong love and devotion to each other is strong. Through hardships and sorrows, laughter and joy, we share life together. It’s a persistent reminder that you’re not alone. It’s impossible to ignore. We move into the new house today. We are family now.

Out of the ashes springs new life.