The Jilting...

 When I was teaching juniors and even when I taught ENGL 112 at the college, I used the short story "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall" by Katherine Anne Porter as one of the selections to study.

In that story Granny is on her deathbed, surrounded by some of her children. In her early life she had been jilted at the altar before her first marriage was to occur.  She never forgave her intended husband, nor had she forgiven God for allowing that to happen to her.  Even though she did marry, she had children and grandchildren in her family, and she had lived a long life on a farm, working hard to survive, she still was angry.  She felt she had been jilted, plain and simple.

When the priest visited her to give her last rites, she was stubborn and refused.  Her children were distraught because they feared for her soul.  The one thing that remained strong within her was her stubbornness and refusal to forgive.  Her body was giving up.  Her mind, her heart, her spirit were not.  

At the end of the story, with her children pleading, she turned her head to the candle, breathed the words "I cannot forgive!" and blew out the flame, sending the room into darkness.  End of story.

Sometimes we would watch the film version of the story which gave faces, bodies, and voices to the characters as well as distinct images in the bedroom which was the entire setting of the story.  It was always very dramatic when the screen went to black after her final breath extinguished the candle.

My question to the students was always, "And so...what happened to Granny's soul?" and they would always answer either "Well, she sure didn't go to heaven!" or "I know she went to Hell!"  

In May 2017 Mom was hospitalized after a fall which broke her hip.  When we visited her on Mother's Day, she had mersa which meant we couldn't enter the room without "suiting up" so Greta and I opted to remain in the hallway while Gary, the brave one who claimed he wasn't scared, donned the clothes, hat, and gloves and entered the room to help Mom with writing on the white board and gave her small sips of water to help her dry mouth.  That day was the last time I saw her alive, and I will always remember her little wave as we left the ICU.

Through the week Greta would call with daily updates of her progress or new developments.  On Wednesday one of the ministers at the church where Greta works asked if he could visit Mom.  During his time with her they chatted, but he also asked if he could share the gospel and ultimately before leaving, he asked if he could pray with her. 

Mom didn't talk much about her faith.  She had been raised in the Quaker (Society of Friends) church, but we attended the Congregational Christian Church in Westville before moving to Mt. Vernon and she had been baptized there along with Grandma, Greta, and me.  Her attendance at the Presbyterian Church in Mt. Vernon started strong, but even though I am not sure of the details, I think she was creating some issues there with the other women and the minister asked her to decrease her participation in the women's groups.  After that she and Dad never attended a church regularly, with her claiming that every one they attended 'didn't believe like I do' and therefore they stopped going on Sunday mornings. Every time she and Dad came to Indiana for events such as the girls' baptisms or Christmas programs at St. Mark's Lutheran Church, she found problems or mistakes that she would remind me of.  When we returned to the Francesville Christian Church, she didn't like Jim's sermons or the fact that we took communion every Sunday---she just didn't believe in that.  But when asked what she DID believe, she had no answer. Both Greta and I were surprised that she allowed the minister to share the gospel with her and then pray that day.

Reports from the nurses that evening post-visit were that Mom was agitated, she tossed and turned, she was unruly, she was muttering unintelligibly for several hours.  Then a sense of calmness came over here, a peacefulness, and in the early morning hours, she passed from this life to the next.

At one point during the next few days as Greta related these events to me, I thought of the short story.  In it Granny was fighting against God.  She couldn't forgive Him for her being jilted, not only at the altar, but in life.  She felt like she hadn't been afforded the life she was meant to live.  And on her deathbed, she refused to forgive Him or accept His grace, and blew out the candle in defiance.  

In real life Mom seemed to be struggling with her acceptance of her life and God's forgiveness of her sins perhaps.  She had related to me at the nursing home a few weeks before her death how one of the boys in her class had put his hands where he shouldn't have, she had told her parents, they had taken the issue to the church board so that he could be punished, and the board had turned the story into blaming my mother for the transgression, not the boy.  She had not forgotten that.  Maybe that had soured her views of the church.  Maybe she struggled with her beliefs. Perhaps she had tried at the Westville church and then again at the Presbyterian Church but had been rebuked for her endeavors.  Other factors such as the move itself and being away from family (with no internet or cell phones or text messaging in the 1960s) were difficult for her and she took it out on Greta and me (which is another story entirely).  Even moving back to Wooster had its challenges as Greta and I had moved into adulthood and she couldn't control us anymore. She was unhappy with human relationships, always looking for ulterior motives and convincing herself that she was better than whoever she might have a disagreement with.   She found solace in material possessions.  In fact she told us and Dad many times that her things were the most important aspect of her life. But as her life was drawing to a close, she was quite concerned that her 'things' were not touched or moved, but as the old saying goes...'You can't take it with you' which I think was bothering her also. 

I truly believe that Mom was Granny in real life.  Fighting against forgiveness and making things right with God.  The difference between them is that Granny blew out the candle in defiance; Mom didn't.  The moments when Mom became calm, peaceful, even serene point toward her acceptance of God's grace and the forgiveness of her sins.

I was reminded of this yesterday.  I recounted this story to a friend who hadn't realized that the relationship between my mother and me and my sister had been so strained and difficult.  She agreed with me that the character in Porter's short story and my mother were very similar.  

But you know what...God always gives you what you need to hear when you need to hear it.  As I was studying today's lesson in the Proverbs 31 OBS this afternoon, this passage struck me: "It's only when we recognize our sin, confess our sin, and give our lives to Christ that we can enter into Jesus' promised rest and receive His unsurpassing peace."

Wait.  Read that again.  Recognizing one's sin and confessing it might be extremely difficult and there could be a struggle in the act of recognition.  Another struggle might come as one fights about giving one's life to Christ which means confession of those sins.  But that once the sinner does confess and Jesus accepts that confessions and forgives...peace is overwhelming.  It is promised.  It just has to be accepted by the sinner.

And I truly believe that is what happened in that hospital room the night before Mom died on May 19, 2017.