DAILY PRACTICES For God’s People
Chapter excerpts from
The Virtue of Dying Well
by The Reverend Deacon Ann Fritschner
32 pages
Dying well encompasses living well, preparing well, and trusting enough in God to believe in and accept reconciliation. It is a virtue because it involves being faithful to God’s call to us and responding with an unfettered “yes!” to the abundant, grace-filled life God wants each of us to relish. It is a virtue because it is a process that every human being will experience, one that so many of us obsess over and dread, yet do so little to prepare for. It is a virtue because so many of us focus on the fear and potential pain surrounding death and dying that we lose sight of the gifts inherent in the process of rejoining God, the one ultimate healer and reconciler. And it is a virtue because an integral part of dying well is living well, which requires continual acts of reconciliation—with ourselves, with others, and with God.
Chapter Contents
• What is Dying Well?
• A Theological Perspective
• What the Bible Reveals about Dying Well
• How Can I Cultivate the Virtue of Dying Well?
• Tools for the Journey
• Activities for Cultivating Dying Well
Prayer
Restoration from Fatigue
O God, whose days are without end, and whose mercies cannot be numbered: Make us, we pray, deeply aware of the shortness and uncertainty of human life; and let your Holy Spirit lead us in holiness and righteousness all our days; that, when we shall have served you in our generation, we may be gathered to our ancestors, having the testimony of a good conscience, in the communion of the Catholic Church, in the confidence of a certain faith, in the comfort of a religious and holy hope, in favor with you, our God, and in perfect charity with the world. All this we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
—Book of Common Prayer, 504