Talking about Death – Western Culture IX

The "thanatological revolution" of the 1970s called our attention to our widespread denial of death and had an impact on tens of thousands of people, many of them in the helping professions.

In an atmosphere of denial sustained by both church and culture, it is not surprising that most of us have serious difficulty not only in relating to the dying and grieving but also in imagining our own mortality. Yet historically, the religious traditions have assigned tremendous importance to the awareness of one’s own death.