We “only die once and after that comes judgment.” Why do we die, though? And why only once?

Death is not God’s work or will, for He is Life itself. So, death can only be the result of a radical separation from Life, from God. Such separation is the meaning of sin. In other words, death results from sin, mortal (= “deathly”) sin. And because we are neither just souls nor bodies, sin and death affect both soul and body. Only the return to God can return us to Life, in soul and in body.

We only die once because we are each unique and unrepeatable human beings. We are personally responsible before God for who we become by the choices we make throughout our lives. We sculpt our final form by the decisions we make. That process is limited by death. Remembering our mortality lends an urgency that we use our time to bring our lives to fulfilment in the sight of God. Death ends the time of grace and mercy which God offers us to work out our earthly life in keeping with His will, and so to decide our ultimate destiny. When “the single course of our earthly life” (LG 48.3) is completed, there is no “reincarnation” after death (CCC, n.1013).

The life and death of Jesus change the meaning of human life and death. For He did not die because He sinned, but because we sinned. His death was not due to a free and radical separation of Himself from God in disobedience but was a free and radical surrender of Himself to God in obedience. Carrying as He did all our sins and guilt in Himself, on His Body on the Tree, His self-surrender to the Father destroyed all sin and therefore all death. His resurrection restores our life in soul and body and reunites us to God. Yet clearly all these achievements and gifts of Christ can only be accessed by those who freely choose to accept them. He will not force Himself on anyone. While He does make these gifts available to humanity in different ways, He does so chiefly through the ministry of His own Bride and Body, the Church.

“What is essentially new about Christian death is this: through Baptism, the Christian has already ‘died with Christ’ sacramentally, in order to live a new life; and if we die in Christ’s grace, physical death completes this ‘dying with Christ’” (CCC, 1010). As he was on the way to being thrown to the lions, the great St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote: “It is better for me to die in Christ Jesus than to reign over the ends of the earth. Him it is I seek – who died for us. Him it is I desire – who rose for us. I am on the point of giving birth …. Let me receive pure light; when I shall have arrived there, then shall I be a man” (ibid.).

The well-known devotional writing, “the Imitation of Christ” by Thomas a Kempis, has a couple of telling lines on readiness for death. Urging us to stay away from sin, it reads: “Every action of yours, every thought, should be those of one who expects to die before the day is out …. If you aren’t fit to face death today, it’s very unlikely you will be tomorrow” (Imitation, 1-23-1). Earlier, St. Francis of Assisi could cry: “Praised are you, my Lord, for our sister bodily Death” (Canticle of Creatures).

“After death comes judgment.” A judgment or verdict means to say what the truth of something is. The truth itself comes first; then the judgment puts it into words. If I say there is a parcel at the front door when there’s none, my judgment is false; if there is one, then my judgment is true. The parcel first; the true judgment follows. Similarly, when we come before Christ after death to receive our particular judgment, He will simply declare the truth He sees, who He sees us to be, the “parcel and package” we have become. When I was a judge at the Catholic Tribunal in Glasgow, I could only judge on the basis of the evidence before me. I couldn’t make things up or admit evidence irrelevant to the case in hand. But I had to make the judgment with reference to what the law required, not in accordance with my own ideas.

So, what is the law to which Jesus refers when He passes judgment on the evidence of our lives? He is Himself that Law, in person. He is the measure of who we are and are meant to be or to become. That’s what it means to say that we are created in His image and likeness, or to say that the Holy Spirit works in us to conform us to the image and likeness of the Son. Christ does not judge us on our own ideas or convictions about ourselves, no matter how deeply or passionately held those ideas or convictions may be. He does of course take into consideration our fragility and weakness, as well as all our efforts to love and sacrifice ourselves. But our task in life is to put on the mind of Christ, not the mind of the time we live in or of the latest ideology or passing fad of human invention. It is not we who give the verdict on whether or not we are in conformity with Christ, but only He.

At the heart of what it means to be like Christ is Christ’s selfless love. The mind of Christ is to empty Himself in loving obedience to the Father and in loving surrender to us as our Redeemer. In the evening of life, we shall be judged on that love, as St. John of the Cross tells us. To live in this truly authentic love to the best of our ability is to live like Christ, to die like Christ and to be ready to meet Christ when life’s little day draws to a close. Love casts out fear, and most especially the fear of death and the fear of judgment. For what love of Christ is it to be afraid of Him?

When He comes at the end of our life and at the end of time, it will not be to deal with sin. He did that at His first coming. It will be to reward those who wait for Him, which is just another way of saying those who love Him and love like Him. Now is the time for us to do away with sin by allowing His love to possess us in charity, in worship and prayer and in willing sacramental confession of our sins against love. Christ’s mercy is not a free ticket to sin but a solemn claim on our commitment to repent. If we live only once, die only once and are judged only once, then let us stir ourselves while we still have the time to put on the mind of Christ and to be owned by the heart of Christ. Then we will understand the words of St. Paul, “to me life is Christ and thus death gain”; and we will hopefully hear addressed to us one fine day those beautiful and consoling words of the Crucified to the repentant thief: “Today, you will be with me in Paradise.”