suicide

My cousin couldn’t manage the pain

The family buried Richard’s ashes on Easter weekend. Richard had purchased his headstone years earlier, his quirky sense of humour coming through with ‘Hello world’ preceding his birthdate inscription and ‘Goodbye world’ ready for the addition of his date of death. (Photo by Amy Rinner Waddell)

Note: This reflection deals with the subject of suicide.

On Nov. 27, a Saturday, I received a long text message from my cousin Richard (I’m using only his middle name here, for privacy), also sent to other extended family members. “I hope none of you ever have to go to a pain-management clinic,” he began. “They are a joke and out for money.”

Can we talk about suicide?

'If we are unable to speak of the crushing struggle that compels someone to end his or her life, we give it even more power,' Melissa Miller writes. (Photo courtesy of Pixabay)

A few months ago, a preacher at our church included suicide in his sermon. Philippians 1 was the text, where the Apostle Paul sets out his dilemma between preferring life or death. “My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better; but to remain in the flesh is more necessary for you,” Paul writes.

Suicide isn’t painless

Nick Brandt, front row second from right, with his family in happier times. (Photo courtesy of the Brandt family)

(Photo courtesy of the Brandt family)

No one saw it coming. Not family, not friends, not anyone at the university he attended. On March 23, 2018, after babysitting his nieces and nephews, 18-year-old Nicholas (Nick) Penner Brandt returned to the apartment he shared with an older brother and twin sister, drank poison and died.

Small-town suicide

I wrote this story two years ago, and since then another suicide has occurred and been mourned, in a neighbouring community. That man I did know. To remember both of these men who left behind wives, children, even grandchildren, today I publish it. Let’s learn how to handle mental illness in the church in a way that embraces rather than isolates.

It is with a heavy heart that I write today, and even now I debated sharing this. I do so because I believe that the story I am about to share is one with a lesson that we, the Mennonite church, need to learn.

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