#FultonFridays: The Meaning of Death

Because this past Wednesday we reflected on our mortality and heard, “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return,” I thought it fitting to share a meditation from Bishop Sheen on the meaning of death. 
Death is an affirmation of the purpose of life in an otherwise meaningless existence. The world could carry on its godless plan if there were no death. What death is to an individual, that catastrophe is to a civilization—the end of its wickedness. This is the source of anguish to the modern mind, for not only must man die, but the world must die. Death is a negative testimony to God’s power in a meaningless world, for by it God brings meaningless existence to naught.
Because God exists, evil cannot carry on its wickedness indefinitely. If there were no catastrophe such as the Apocalypse reveals at the end of the world, the universe would then be the triumph of chaos. But the catastrophe is a reminder that God will not allow unrighteousness to become eternal.
Life Means Something
Death proves also that life has meaning, because it reveals that the virtues and goodness practiced within time do not find their completion except in eternity.
Man is much more afraid of dying in a train wreck or automobile accident than he is of dying on a battlefield or as a martyr to his faith. This proves that death is less terrifying and more meaningful when we rise above the level of the commonplace and lift ourselves into the realm of spiritual values.
That death is the end of evil revealed too in the fact that the face of the death is often more harmonious than the same face in life, as the sleeping face more restful than the face awake. The ugly feelings and hates, eccentricities and discords disappear