What Makes How We Treat the Dead "Christian?"

[Ken Carman]

Beginning caveat: I am probably going to do this a little backwards. Usually I write a column, post a thread and then provide a link if anyone wants further info on my opinion in regard to this subject. This time I'm thinking of posting the question and then possibly include your attributed comments in my column. I would use your "handle" unless you tell me to do otherwise, or not quote you at all. PM me if you think that's a better way to approach quoting you, or not.

Here's the question...

What makes the usual way we treat the dead "Christian," or even sane? We empty the body of fluids, fill it with formaldehyde, patch together defects that happened when you died... like in a car accident: almost like we used to bondo our cars. If it's for when God raises the dead, "Oh Ye of little faith!!!" Do you really believe God can't remake what was made before? Do we really have all that good research that having the body there helps with "closure?"

Note: I'm a bit of an atheist when it comes to "closure." I've had lots of people die in my life, often in tragic ways like falling on a floor furnace that was shooting flames then going through 3 months of burn therapy, losing an arm, then dying anyway. I have never felt closure from any funeral. What, at best, might be called "closure" is always incomplete, and takes time. You have to integrate it all into your life.

The death I mentioned was my father. In that case we never saw the body: it was cremated. I spread the ashes and ranted about his more nonsensical decisions in life... he who kept claiming we should live our lives "logically." I found that far more therapeutic than say my mother who died after 7 hideous years of cancer. Her body faker than a mannequin, drenched in formaldehyde.

More on all that when, and if, I write the column. I'll tag the thread with a link after I write it and the column is published.

I'd love to see a debate here regarding how we treat the dead and how much good any of this does us. They say such ceremonies and services are for the living, not the dead. But are they really all that good for the living?

[crimethinker]

I prefer the Klingon model of howling into the sky to warn the dead that a Klingon warrior is about to arrive, and then discarding the corpse as an empty shell.

In all seriousness, I believe in a certain level of gravitas about the dead. I have no particular justification, it's just how I feel. Cremation seems the best to me. It's affordable, sanitary, and not garish as I feel Christian funerals are. Also, the act of spreading the ashes over a specified location seems a good commemoration and to offer completion.

That said, that scene in The Big Lebowski with the coffee can of ashes is hilarious.

[Angry Citizen]

Sure, they can be. The point isn't the rituals or the ceremony, it's the social aspect. People come together for the express purpose of talking about the dead person. Talking is a necessary aspect of psychological mending. Hence, funerals have a mending effect on one's psyche.

Personally, I eschew funerals.

[Ken Carman]

Sure, they can be. The point isn't the rituals or the ceremony, it's the social aspect. People come together for the express purpose of talking about the dead person. Talking is a necessary aspect of psychological mending. Hence, funerals have a mending effect on one's psyche.

Personally, I eschew funerals.

Never has for me, but everyone's different, I suppose. I'd love to hook up a gizmo and a tape that, when a button is pressed, the corpse sits up, looks at a speaker, and says with the voice of the deceased, "Now you know damn well that's NOT the truth!" Eh, but why ruin it for others?

CT

Love the Klingon reference.

[ozzie666]

i think that, as angry citizen says, the funeral is more for the attendee's to talk and reminisce on all the good memories of that person. and if, say the deceased was mutilated in a car crash, open casket or not, people would rather the body be composed, at least a little i would imagine.

i to prefer cremation for the same reasons stated, and the burial or scattering to be done privately by the deceased's immediate family. in this sense i think it helps for loved ones to begin to find some closure.

i suppose all i've said is very generalised though isnt it? death is a cruel mistress. inevitable and unforgiving. and it can affect a man in many different ways. so maybe we cant say for sure?

[LetThereBe]

I personally do not like funerals... more because of the fakeness of it.
Not just the minor-taxidermy that is performed on the corpse, but the emotion and meaning behind it. I don't understand how you get closure by trying to make the body look alive or "at peace". I think you would have better closure by staring death in the face... to see the wreckage that was once a loved one, but now is clearly an empty shell.

While I think it is most moral to donate my body to science, I would otherwise wish for my loved ones themselves to deal with my body. Instead of putting on a pretty suit and paying vultures in the funeral industry thousands of dollars to transport, package, and dispose of my meat... I would want them to pick up a shovel and do it themselves. I have always found such simple physical tasks therapeutic. It seems like it would be a good way to bond and heal, while facing the honest reality of what death is.

[Jack]

In my opinion our funeral rites are traditions that no longer are practical or necessary. A lot of land is wasted for cemeteries. A dead body is nothing to get sentimental over, it's a bag of meat and bone. The life is gone from it, the person who once resided within is no longer. I just can't sympathize with our superstitious treatment of dead bodies.

As to what makes our treatment of the dead Christian; it depends on which sect of Christianity we're discussing. Christian dogma isn't consistent across all denominations when it comes to how to treat the dead.

[iolo]

Funerals are a matter of social cohesion and showing friendship and respect for the family, and for the family itself organising them is something to do with the earlier days before proper mourning can start. Ritual is vital to living as civilized human beings. Since none of my own family can stand them, I always go as our family representative, feeling a duty to keep civilisation going where at all possible.

[JimmyNic]

The Christian funeral rites you speak of are to the best of my knowledge not particularly linked to the Bible, but religious tradition evolves as time goes on and ideas migrate. Some derive a sense of comfort from it, and personally I find churchyards oddly soothing. As for the treatment of the body, most people aren't at their prettiest when they hop off to meet their maker, so it makes sense that the corpse be done up a bit if you want an open casket. If not then it really doesn't matter.

I'd agree funerals are for the living. Your mileage may vary on what gives effective closure, and to be honest I think most people carry the weight of bereavement for the rest of their lives, so perhaps the term is something of a misnomer. I guess you do what you feel you should do, pick yourself up and carry on. What more can you do?

[loser]

For the most part, funerals are a place where people can go to pretend that they cared about someone. These same people that flock to funerals (to be seen by others) are the same ones that never visited the 'living'. While they were alive, a visit would have meant something to that person. Once dead, your visit is only self-serving. Jesus understood human nature. This prompted Him to say:

Luke 9:60 Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead: but go thou and preach the kingdom of God.


If you weren't there for them while they were still alive, there is little that you can do for them in death.

I was by my mother's side all the time that she was sick and dying, When she finally died, I left her carcass to the vultures to fight over.

I know who really loved her...

[Ken Carman]

Funerals are a matter of social cohesion and showing friendship and respect for the family, and for the family itself organising them is something to do with the earlier days before proper mourning can start. Ritual is vital to living as civilized human beings. Since none of my own family can stand them, I always go as our family representative, feeling a duty to keep civilisation going where at all possible.

I suppose I understand the context here, if after such afters one was treated better for the effort. I tend to find family relationships settle into the same old, same old anyway... just like when you show up at a family reunion years after you've achieved so much, done so much, and are still treated as the upstart younger brother who no one should listen to while the oldest brother who is as bad: or worse, gets respect. This is one example: there are obviously many.

But there is something to your argument, depending on what the "matter of social cohesion" is. Families in the past used to attend beheadings, the Roman "games" complete with hungry wild beasts... so in comparison a funeral is a mild inconvenience. Yet I can't help but be bothered by the presence of something that once was who you are (maybe) grieving for: in plastoid form.

I have heard it said that some will never truly belief that person is dead unless they see them that way. To me this involves mostly the clueless and conspiracy nuts: both who will believe damn near anything no matter what we do. I never saw what was my father, except the ashes. I saw what was my mother and it was disturbing what was done to her, and having something like that in the room at all times would only matter if zombies were real. I felt that way in every funeral I've attended where the corpse has to be present. My wife's family has had many funerals and and during one couples were to go up to the corpse and kneel in front of it. I've seen a few funerals like this in my life: some even kiss the corpse during these type of affairs, caress the wretched thing. I only made it through that one because I told my wife I would only do it if I could pretend to be elsewhere. Sort of worked.

[Ken Carman]

As promised, here's a link to the column on this topic, including many comments posted here. Should be up on a number of sites by tonight. Feel free to pull quotes, or concepts, out and add them to any comments you wish to make...

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