{"id":6313,"date":"2019-10-23T12:50:08","date_gmt":"2019-10-23T16:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/news\/news-2\/knowing-how-live-knowing-how-die\/"},"modified":"2019-10-23T12:50:08","modified_gmt":"2019-10-23T16:50:08","slug":"knowing-how-live-knowing-how-die","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/news\/news-2\/knowing-how-live-knowing-how-die\/","title":{"rendered":"Knowing How to Live, Knowing How to Die"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

SASMAD and Its Blessings<\/strong>
\n
\nFor Christiane Lemaire, a volunteer at SASMAD (Pastoral Home Care), assisting people until the very end brought her to the realization that Christ\u2019s death on the Cross is the first death to ponder. She told the story of Marie T. and of the beautiful light that came upon her face after receiving the last rites. Christiane often sees the \u2018joy related to the final blessing\u2019 on the face of the dying. She also talked about Gerry who \u2018had prayed not to die alone.\u2019 \u2018Maybe, you will be the one,\u2019 he said to her one day. In all her stories, one could see that receiving pastoral care and having someone at one\u2019s side when crossing the veil are men and women greatest needs. \u2018We die as we have lived,\u2019 she added, explaining that some people reconcile with their existence during their last days. \u2018Have a great death,\u2019 she concluded, making people laugh.<\/p>\n\n

The Sound of Waves<\/strong>
\n
\n\u2018Pastoral care, especially in difficult cases, requires sheer inventiveness coming from the heart,\u2019 Patrick Vinay gently said. It is to the sound of the \u2018waves\u2019 from a tambourine he played that we were introduced to the mystery of dialogue, something he discovered giving pastoral care. \u2018This is when I stop talking to let the sound of waves flow in,\u2019 he said in this emotional moment. He told wonderful stories of the people he met and the relationships he developed in palliative care, where he got greatly involved as a retired doctor and ex-dean at the University of Montreal. \u2018What this person [who goes through sickness towards death] does is [\u2026] reaching to the very end of his or her own identity.\u2019 They become who they really are, added this man, the author of several books (Ombres et lumi\u00e8res sur la fin de la vie and most recently \u00c0 tire d\u2019aile).<\/p>\n\n

Dying the Way We Want<\/strong>
\n
\nTo conclude this evening, the Most Rev. Christian L\u00e9pine, Archbishop of the Diocese of Montreal, reflected on a passage of Jesuite Fran\u00e7ois Varillon: \u2018The art of dying at the heart of loving\u2019. As he went through a Gospel passage drawn from the Gospel of John (10:18), \u2018[my life] no one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord,\u2019 Archbishop L\u00e9pine said that \u2018it\u2019s at the moment of dying that we can truly offer our life\u2019 and added that \u2018we learn to integrate our own sickness, suffering and death, in our vocation to love. A beautiful calling to love in spite of everything.<\/p>\n\n

This conference took place as part of the project \u201cPROJECTION, une semaine de dialogue,\u201d an opportunity to \u201cbreak taboos\u201d regarding the end of life and to enhance our thoughts through various lenses, such as \u201cphilosophy, science, society, art and education,\u201d among others. From Oct. 14\u201320, a whole set of events were made available to the general public in order to explore this thematic furthermore.<\/p>\n\n

For more information on the project \u201cPROJECTION, une semaine de dialogue\u201d: https:\/\/semaineprojection.ca\/en<\/a>
\n
\nFor info on SASMAD<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SASMAD and Its Blessings For Christiane Lemaire, a volunteer at SASMAD (Pastoral Home Care), assisting people until the very end…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6314,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nouvelle"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diocesemontreal.wp.vortexdev.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}