A king of the Middle Ages gave one of his servants a strange standing order. Every morning this servant was to march into the king’s chamber, and no matter what the king was doing, announce in a loud voice, “You must die!” I doubt if many of us would appreciate that kind of daily reminder of the inevitability of our own death, much less order it.
Christians in the Middle Ages seem to have been terribly preoccupied with the subject of death. The pictures and writings of that time are filled with images of skeletons and everlasting judgment. But at least it can be said of those times that the reality of death was not evaded. it has been said that in the past everyone in polite society talked about death but no one talked about sex; whereas today everyone talks about sex but no one talks about death. It has been said also that the person who has not confronted death is not…
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