When a sister is dying at the Mount, others in the community
sign up to sit with her for an hour at a time to ensure that she is not alone at the time of death. I sat with Sr.
Noreen Hurter several times in the week before her death, and it was a moving
experience.
The first thing I noticed was a sense of being much more centered
than usual. Dying is a sacred process, and for this hour, nothing was more
important than being in this room with Sr. Noreen as she moved closer to the
doorway to death. Contributing to the sense of being centered was the focus on
her breathing, that connection to life that we usually take for granted.
As a Benedictine, Sr. Noreen was steeped in the psalms in
her many years of communal prayer, so I thought it might be comforting for her
to hear some of the psalms read aloud. I was surprised at how many of the
psalms related to the dying process, as they spoke of longing to be with God,
trust in God’s promises, fear, forgiveness, regret, and being known intimately by
God. Reading the psalms to Sr. Noreen gave me a deeper connection with and
appreciation for these ancient prayers.
As care providers and others keeping vigil and came and
went, I was moved by their reverence and tenderness as they spoke to Sr. Noreen,
held her hand, kissed her, or stroked her hair. It is a gift to have time to
say goodbye—a gift that isn’t always available to us—and a cause for gratitude.
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