Greetings from the Xyphokonic Order and Ordinance. I once again welcome you all back to our Sacred space this Period to continue our discussions revolving around the general topic of Death or Spiritual Ends. When last we gathered, I offered a greater elaboration to clear up any misunderstandings about how the Foreseeing Authority works. Today, we move back into proximity and shall speak about teaching the often tough concept and experience of Death to our children. The finality of Death can be a difficult experience for a child to process, and I find it important to know how we, as Xyphoites, should approach relating the topic to our children. Let us begin.
Under Lord Vuetenexzyei’s First Period of Watching earlier this year, I essentially laid out a selection of Commentary that addressed our human relation to Death—starting with talking about the natural fears we may face, dealing with grief on a personal and macro scale, and establishing cultural practices for Ceremonies of Death. We can utilize a lot of what was written then to help teach Death’s reality to youth. We can start with the philosophical understanding. Virtually all the concepts embedded within the Philosophy involve our experience with the Lords’ Greater Will and the Initial Will of Love; the Lords Love our Existence, and gift us with the ability to freely experience it. We cherish our lives and assign our own meaning and worth to them. That value, however, comes from understanding that Life is not eternal and that the Darkness of Death will eventually expire that Golden Light of Life.
Throughout all the various lessons and takeaways of the Philosophy that we teach to our children, they learn philosophically that the point to focus on is to celebrate existence while also seeing that its value comes from the fleeting reality of its own fragility. We care for our lives because we acknowledge that all good things must come to an end, and that end is an expected and normal reality to face. Relinquishing that fear of an eventual end by approaching it with dignity and with expected closure of our own story.
Next, of course, we must understand that grief in youth will understandably hit hard. The loss of a loved one’s life suddenly removes something a child may take as a constant staple. And so, on top of teaching the experience of Death from a philosophical view, we must also allow our children to grieve and experience that natural feeling as well while supervising their experience and assuring they do not collapse under the realization of it. Often times, we can teach Death on a smaller scale through experiencing it via our pets. Here, we have living beings under our care—a beloved family cat or dog, a bird, fish, rats, rabbits etc—that, of course, will eventually die as all mortals shall. When we allow our children to love, cherish, and care for such companions, we also allow them to experience the loss of those companions who will likely have much shorter lives than we do.
We honor the memory of those animal companions, dignify their Deaths, hold and console our children, but we must let them witness that their pet has passed away and that this is a reality that all mortal life shall one day go through. There is nothing to fear from the natural ceasing of Life, and the feelings a child will have when their pet dies are valid and should be allowed to process. As mentioned in this Commentary, the grieving process, while still personal, is also communal, and so the entire family will come together and spiritually heal in those cases, and will insulate the grieving children with Love as we commemorate the Remembrance of the deceased. It’s crucial to never leave a child in the darkness of Death; always illuminate a path to acceptance and healing through the love of the family and the community.
Finally, we speak of the role youth play in the actual Ceremonies of Death themselves. When discussing the “Procession of Death” Hymn, we mentioned in this Commentary that such a hymn is only sung by the adult voices of the House Choir—barring the youth from having to carry the burden of bring in the dead. However, this does not mean that the youth are not present for these Ceremonies or are entirely barred from participating in the process itself. Quite the contrary, when speaking of the House Choir itself, the participation of youth voices is actually a crucial part to the Soul Ushering portion of the Ceremony. As mentioned before, the Hymn of the Child of Purity is a hymn written to be sung by exclusively by the youth voices of the Choir—which are considered the “innocents” demanding Mercy from suffering.
This highlights the importance of youth in the process of understanding Death. While adults are expected to own the burden of carrying the dead, the youth act as a spot of future hope and continuation of existence through their innocent and rejuvenating Purity. The hymn reflects that calls of the innocent to be purified from suffering, and that authentic call is a healing power that helps ward off the suffering and grief that comes naturally from Death. Letting children not only be an audience to the Ceremony of Death but also to play a crucial role in the Choir’s invocation of healing within that Ceremony helps teach youth that Death is a universal experience and that they, too, are part of understanding and ushering it into place. Having that communal role and duty helps teach that grief is not meant to be carried alone, and that we all play our part in uplifting others who are currently grieving. Through that shared spiritual duty, children can learn not to grieve alone or to fear the deaths of their loved ones as they know their entire community will come and raise them above those rough tides and grieve together.
Through these important lessons and community experiences, we can nurture our children and allow them to process grief in a healthy and safe manner while also offering an ironclad support system that teaches togetherness and family bonding both on a small but also a mass scale. The goal is to remove the chilling finality that is often applied to Death and replace it with a philosophical understanding of it and alongside a spiritual Love that comforts and consoles the overall experience. That is, in essence, what it means to follow a Doctrine of Spiritual Love, which is the core meaning of this Xyphoist Faith.
—crX
