Somber Topic - Funerals
Hello:
The world is full of things that I don't understand and quite frankly I'm ok with that. I'm the type guy who is naturally inquisitive and wants to understand everything - but has been far enough along the journey of life to accept that he won't. Ocasionally I encounter something though, that seems like it should have an obvious explanation. One of the many things I tend to hyperfocus about are my company's web sales (considering that I am responsible for all our electronic efforts including web sales - this is not a bad thing). I love to watch orders flicker by (when there isn't enough volume the flicker becomes a glub) and try to discern patterns from what people are buying (or not buying). The pattern I've picked up on this weekend is a little disturbing - funerals.
All of our funeral titles are flying off the shelves. Is the entire Catholic faith planning some
lemming like rite in the next few weeks? Will I come in to work at Liguori Publications and the only sound will the echo of my footsteps as I walk to my office? I really don't mean to sound flip about this, it just seems so strange. Here I am preparing to talk about holiday gift suggestions and instead I am writing about funerals. It is true that death rates peak near the holidays, but I would expect that type of response to be parishes buying in bulk. The majority of the sales I have seen have been single copies to individuals. Usually, I would call a couple of customers and see what was going on - but that doesn't seem appropriate in this case.I fervently hope that none of my readers have a need for this material, but I am going to feature two of our better titles on the subject. Your Guide to a Catholic Funeral which is a 'pastoral' publication and doesn't credit an author as well as A Catholic Funeral by Patricia Rice. I haven't read either of these titles, I can only tell you that they are selling well. I'm going to show one
more that I gave to my Grandfather after we lost my Grandmother. My Grandfather isn't Catholic, but he said that it gave him some comfort - Coping When Your Spouse Dies by Medard Laz.I'm sure some people will consider this post to be in poor taste - it really isn't intended that way. If anyone has any insight into this, please leave a comment. Hopefully the rest of my posts this season will involve happier topics, like the basketballs and other sports equipment I bought for the children of the Cheyenne River Reservation.
Peace,
P. del Ricci - Dark Glass
posted by Philip Del Ricci | 5:29 PM
5 Comments:
This reminds me I've read a few articles online about eco-friendly burial. The deceased's body doesn't have any preservatives used upon it, so the funeral, etc. must take place quickly after death. The casket is made of biodegradable materials and is buried in a forest that is set aside for conservation. You can choose to have a natural marker such as a naturally occuring stone or plant placed on your grave, but you can't have a normal headstone or any permanent path leading to your grave site. By having your body buried there you are marking that little plot of land for conservation and you really do have "ashes to ashes, dust to dust" with your remains.
ZandPerl:
Always good to hear from you. The only reference I have ever seen to this style of cemetery / funeral was on the episode of 6 Feet Under where they buried Nate. Of course his wife (Lisa?) had been buried even more naturally.
I really like the concept. My Mother wants to be cremated and have her ashes spread around the base of a huge oak tree near a lake we own in Southern Illinois. A couple of our dogs are buried there too.
I read up on Catholic funeral practices a year or so ago. The grandmother of my best friend is buried outside Fort Leonard Wood in Missouri. The family is from Guam and she had very much wanted to be buried on the island. It is of course much cheaper to move an urn than a casket - but the family is devote Catholic and thought that the Church prohibited cremation.
This is a common misconception of Church teaching. So long as cremation is not performed to "deliberately thwart resurrection at the second coming", the Church does not have an issue with it.
In the case of my friend's Grandmother, it turns out that she specifically did not want to be cremated and the family is holding off on moving the body until later.
Peace,
P. Del Ricci - Dark Glass
the family is devote Catholic and thought that the Church prohibited cremation.
Yeah, I thought all Christian teaching was against cremation. If I had to give you a reason, I would've had to say that it was because of the bodily resurrection at Armageddon. But then again, there's been many people lived, died, buried, and decomposed since the days of Jesus, and those bodies couldn't conceivably rise up in any form resembling a body...
As for cremation, the environmental argument against that is that burning the body releases carbon dioxide (a greenhouse gas) into the atmosphere while burial in any form recycles the carbon into the soil. I'd be interested in ecofriendly burial myself, but it seems like there's very few places that do so, so it'd be a pain for those I left behind. (I'd like to think I'm an environmentalist but not an "enviro-nazi.")
Instead, my primary wish is for my body to be donated to science for research or training med students - in particular, I have a rare skin condition that I'd be glad to have up-and-coming doctors learn more about. However, I doubt my parents would put up with that, so I've told them I'd just want various organs donated for transplant. Except maybe my brain... Too many sci-fi horror stories floating in my head. :-P
I am sure some of it has been due to the large increase in people being diagnosed with cancer in one form or another.
I personally know of four people that have passed away in the past six months from cancer, including my last Grandparent (Grandfather on my Mother's side), and know of three more that have advance stages of cancer that are not expected to make it through next year.
Many people are concerned and reading up on what to expect?
Don
I hope this comment doesn't seem too disjointed. I'm trying to respond to a variety of points brought up by ZandPerl and Don. Thanks for commenting guys!
I've noticed that over the past few days - the number of obituaries has increased significantly. I think it was Saturday's paper that had more than 2 full pages.
Cancer deaths are interesting because not only are we exposed to more carcinogens than historically normal but we tend to live longer allowing more time for cancer to develop.
Z - you mentioned that your parents wouldn't go for too extreme of an organ donation. I think it is interesting how these issues come up. I just had a row with my family because I have no desire to buried in the family plot (it is in an area that I have no attachment to). It is true that funeral services are for the living, but I think people can get selfish sometimes over something that is ultimately of no consequence.
Hmmm, I've rushed this and it shows.
Peace,
P. Del Ricci - Dark Glass
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