When John Donne offered his meditation on human solidarity, he framed it in explicitly theological terms: the funeral bell that tolls for my fellow Christians also tolls for me, because we are members of the same Mystical Body. In Donne’s memorable image, we are all chapters in the same book written by the same Author.
Death, on this account, is simply the translation of one of those chapters into a better language. In due course, we can expect God’s hand to “bind up all our scattered leaves again” into the heavenly library. On that day, we shall discern more clearly than we do now that no man is an island, for all the chapters are interwoven.
