Living to Die and Dying to Live: Lessons from a Mussar Teacher & a Palliative Care Doctor

A virtual event presentation by Dr. Alan Morinis and Dr. Beverly Spring

This event is co-sponsored by:

ABOUT THE EVENT:

We all know we are going to die and yet we live as if it will never happen to us. The Jewish spiritual tradition of Mussar seeks to help us come awake so that we might live better, more ethical, more spiritual lives and has recognized that awareness of death can help bring us to that awakening. In this session, we will build a framework of teaching on this subject from the Mussar masters, and fill it in with experiences and stories from 3 decades of service on the front line in palliative care. By drawing on age-old wisdom about living and dying, as well as contemporary experience in caring for the dying, we will explore together with the goal of making sense of the teaching we encounter in the book of Ecclesiastes: “It is better to go to a house of mourning than a house of feasting” and why that is true.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:

Dr. Alan Morinis, DPhil, is Founder of The Mussar Institute, and a leading figure in the contemporary revival of the Mussar movement, a 1,100-year-old Jewish personal and communal spiritual tradition that was nearly lost following the Holocaust. A filmmaker, Rhodes Scholar, and anthropologist whose doctoral research at Oxford University focused on Hindu religious pilgrimages, he reached a personal turning point in his life in 1997 that led to his exploration of Mussar. Following years of study he reinterpreted the ancient Mussar learnings and practices for modern audiences in his books Climbing Jacob’s Ladder and Everyday Holiness. To address the growing public interest in Mussar, he founded The Mussar Institute in 2004. He has since authored two more books, Every Day, Holy Day, and With Heart in Mind.

Dr. Beverly Spring, MD MCFP (PC) is a physician in and former Medical Director of the Vancouver Home Hospice Palliative Care Service, providing support to palliative patients and their families in their homes. She is also a physician with the Vancouver General Hospital Palliative Care Program. She is a Clinical Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of British Columbia and has taught and lectured locally, nationally and internationally. She has received the YWCA Woman of Distinction Award, the Vancouver Medical Association Osler Award, the Canadian Medical Association Honorary Membership Award and a Government of India Award for her contribution to the eradication of smallpox.