Death

We will all die

Today we watched a film called “The Shomer” http://www.campfire.net.au/node/221. This is a documentary on the Jewish burial rites. Some said it was boring others said it was interesting. Regardless of what the students thought it was fantastic at stimulating discussion on death.

Feeling faint, queasy, and nearly throwing up

Despite the fact that every single one of us will die, death is not a popular subject. Students shared that they would not like to work in a funeral parlour. Too depressing, too disturbing and sad. I broke out some of my nursing stories relating to people I’ve cared for who had died. Yes you can care for a dead person; you change their PJ’s, brush their hair and make them ready for their family. Some students were feeling a bit faint. Somehow we got onto organ donation and I talked about my experience in a University where people had donated their bodies and were on display. For example there were heads of people with their skin peeled off so you could see the facial muscles. There were arms that you could pull a leaver that would bend the arm at the elbow to see how the muscles contracted. Fascinating stuff but some students were starting to look pasty enough for me to offer them the waste paper bin : ). People with nursing backgrounds have hardened stomachs.

Fascinating but hard on the stomach

The rubber hits the road

Over the last five weeks students have been encouraged to explore their spirituality. Even those who don’t believe God are encouraged to understand how their non belief affects their life. Death is the greatest test of any belief system. For example the one student who doesn’t believe in God explained that he believed that when we die we continue in another form. Not in a spiritual reincarnation way but in a physical cycle of life way. You die and become compost for other animals and plants which in turn produce life.

I asked this student to explain who religion might help some people face death since he didn’t believe it. To his credit he was very fair and explained that those who believed in an after-life would be comforted to face death because it was not the end for them.

Heaven but not hell

The following may disturb some people. The remaining students said they believed in heaven or a type of heaven but no hell. They thought it would be unfair of God to send people to eternal hell. But what disturbed me was the thought that people who had chosen to live their lives separately to God, who chose not to go to heaven, would be forced to go to heaven. Isn’t that unfair. But do people willingly choose to go to hell? Does that mean people like Hitler are in heaven, or paedophiles?

What about reincarnation?

Hope for life after death

One student suggested that really bad people might have to come back again before going to heaven; they would have to work at their redemption. But what if God provided a means by which people could be redeemed and go to heaven but they rejected that means. Wouldn’t be unfair for those people to be forced to go to heaven?

What we agreed on is that the way we live our lives will affect our next life after death.

Explore

This class is not about what students should believe but rather encourage students to consider very important issues. One day they will die and it would be irresponsible not to have given this some consideration.

Feed back from the students regarding Spirituality Classes

• Good to discuss various topics. Small group and class discussions were informative.

• Good to go into small groups instead of talking as a whole class. Interesting topics and finding out what my classmates thought.

• I enjoyed the classes although the Judaism film was boring. The classes showed me that I’m not as sure where I stand with my religion and maybe never will be.

• It was fun/relaxing to talk about different concepts of spirituality. Maybe go into more detail about other religions.