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Getting Away from Depressing Politics, Let’s Talk About Death
WHOSE FUNERAL IS THIS ANYWAY?
As a pastor doing premarital counseling, I would sometimes shock the bride-to-be with the news that the wedding wasn’t just about her. It wasn’t even just about the bride and groom. Unless they were going alone to city hall, the family and guests are a vital part of the ceremony and must be considered in the planning. That didn’t mean they had to do a wedding just like her mother wanted, but the feelings, needs, and convenience of others needed to be a part of the plans. If she can’t get her mind around the concept that other people should be considered, I wonder about the hope for a lasting marriage.
It’s usually too late, but I have at times wanted to say to a corpse, “It’s not just about you!” I thought of this when Katharine Hepburn passed. She left specific instructions that there would be no funeral or memorial service. Hepburn had many friends in the entertainment industry and millions of fans around the world that would have liked to honor her and express their grief. From beyond the grave, Hepburn said, “Sorry, stuff those feelings. I’m so humble, that though dead, I want to tell you what to do.”
Of course, Kate is not the only one. In ministry I’ve known a number of people over the years who have left instructions, sometimes in a will, that there would be no service to commemorate their life and death. So even if family and friends wanted to commemorate the life of this person they loved, to gather and share the pain they are feeling, they were forbidden from doing so by what they perceived as the force of law in a legal document.
On the other hand, there are times when feelings of the deceased are ignored altogether. In the recent podcast du jour, S-Town, an atheist died and a Christian funeral was held. Everything said at the service contradicted everything the person being “honored” said and believed. But the host of the show said the mother of the deceased seemed to appreciate and be comforted by the service.
It reminded me of a scene in the film, Captain Fantastic. A woman, who hated organized religion, dies and her parents try to give her a good “Christian funeral” and “Christian burial.” He husband disrupts the funeral proclaiming it is all a sham and an affront to his wife’s Buddhist beliefs. His anger is understandable and justified.
Even when the person who died is a believer, the service can be too reverent. Several years ago, the organist of our church passed away; it was sudden and unexpected. Paul would certainly have wanted a Christian service. His mother wanted it to be a Christian service. In fact, she wanted the service to be all about Jesus and not at all about Paul. No stories about how Paul liked to joke or his love for gardening or his work at the local lumber mill. Everything should be about Jesus’ atoning work on the cross which paid the way for heaven, if one believes in Him. And there was certainly to be no talk of Paul’s work with community theater, which I don’t think ever sat well with Paul’s mother. The church service was all about Jesus and nothing else. So members of the theater did their own service to honor Paul, which was all about Paul and how they missed him.
As a pastor, it someone asks for a service without the “God stuff,” I usually try to help them find someone else to do the service. Because I’m called to share what I think is the hope that everyone needs. I feel the need to honor both God and the person who passed and those who wish to honor that person. Balancing those things can be challenging.
I’ve come to believe that a service may accomplish several of the following things, all good:
Honor the deceased, Comfort the bereaved, Contemplate life’s meaning and deepest questions, Acknowledge grief and allow it to be expressed, Allow for expressions of love and grace, and Allow the gathering of family and community. For Christians, there is also the opportunity to celebrate the Cross and the Resurrection and the Life to Come.
Which of these do you consider worthy goals of a memorial?
What might be other goals I didn’t mention?
And finally, who should decide the focus of a memorial or funeral? Should the wishes of the departed always be followed? Or should someone else have priority for making the calls? The spouse? The parents? The children? The siblings? The clergy? The funeral home? Whose funeral is this anyway?
Published in Religion & Philosophy
I am very stern with my children about this. I hate it when people say it’s too hard to visit someone who is dying or they hate hospitals.
Who the hell likes it? No one I know. Yet I go anyway.
I had to physically threaten son #1 to visit a dying neighbor who had been good to him. He went because he’s afraid of me. I told him it only mattered what he did, why he did it was between him and God
:)
Good job.
As a singleton, I’d probably edit this sequence… :-)
I once knew a young man (tutored him in math) who one day talked to his dad about what he wanted for a funeral: everyone to celebrate his life, wear Hawaiian shirts, and generally echo his own joke de vivre.
Six months later, he passed away in an accident. His shattered father donned his best Hawaiian shirt; his best friend brought a guitar and sang Jack Johnson; his preacher uncle talked about faith and said he hoped his nephew, who didn’t have a close relationship with a church, was with God; and almost everyone present followed the instructions to not wear black.
It was a lovely service that was perfect for him.
My grandfather’s service was at his church (very traditional Catholic funeral), as was the reception. At one point, I turned to look for him, expecting to see him happy – knowing that he would have thoroughly enjoyed the service and the company. It fit him and the life he lead.
My grandmother loathed sombre attire (on anyone). We all wore pastels.
Ultimately, I want the funeral to be something that the deceased would have loved.
My mother says funerals are for the living. Whether or not you believe you’ll be able to attend your own funeral from beyond the grave, it’s the living who really need to come together and find “closure” by recognizing the life of the loved one who passed on. And it’s always nice when someone plans their own funeral (which Mom has done), because the grieving are not in a very good position to have to think about all those things. However, Mom also says her plan stipulates that I sing at her funeral. Unfortunately, crying and singing don’t mix well. So I told her that although I will stand up in front of everyone and the music will play, singing will probably be out of the question.
I would want that too for people I loved. :)
Great post. Thank you, Rabbi.
All my life I have avoided funerals when I could – the thought of seeing someone laid out on display is very traumatic for me. If I attend, I ensure my sightline to the deceased is completely obscured from the time I enter until the time I leave.
Dad #1 died last November. His funeral was the Saturday after Thanksgiving. I am his eldest child. The thought of having to stand in front with the family was overwhelming right up until my Stepmom told me he had already been cremated.
I could do my part after that.
Truthfully, while I could absolutely see that the funeral was necessary for my stepmom I never in any way thought it had anything to do with me. I felt it was my job to accept the thoughts and feelings that others spoke while they paid their respects to my Dad – It was almost as though I was comforting them.
I am responsible for executing the wishes of Dad#2 when that time comes. He has insisted that there be no funeral, that he be cremated, and his ashes scattered in the Gulf of Mexico. I will absolutely comply with his wishes.
Following all that, however, there will be a “let’s hang out with Stew” party – I imagine the conversation will be about the recently deceased.
Violating the spirit of his wishes while accomplishing the letter of them.
A mom who can scare a Marine is a wonder to behold.
My first funeral, which I remember fairly well, was that of my mother. I was just turning four at the time, January 1952. I was well aware that she had been very ill; in fact I remember my aunt and uncle taking me to the hospital a few days before she died. Children weren’t allowed to visit, so from the parking lot, my uncle held me up and pointed to a bank of windows and told me to wave to my mother. I didn’t see her, but perhaps it doesn’t matter; she saw me.
What might seem strange by today’s standards is that her body lay in state in the parlor of her parents’ farm house. My auntie took me into the room where the casket was set up, half-open, with a huge bouquet of roses on the closed half. She pulled up a chair so I could stand on it and see my mother. It was a bit strange, because of course the funeral home had added makeup and she was wearing a lovely pink dress. My aunt told me something about her being in heaven, and that any time I wanted, I could come into the room and see my mother. This was actually comforting, though you might not think it. I did once go in when no one else was there.
There are different customs about having children at funerals. In Jerusalem, for example, it is the custom that children do not go to a cemetery, nor pregnant women. For me, it was nothing frightening, and my relatives were just sad. Maybe the expectation that I would be there came from the realistic view of life and death among the rural population, which in addition, still had clear memories of losses during World War II and Korea.
My mother was the second of my grandparent’s eight children to die before she did. My mother had been diagnosed with diabetes at the age of ten, just two years after insulin became available, but her diabetes was never in good control, given the treatment tools available at the time. She had had two other children; both died at birth, and of course, the medical advice at the time was that no woman who had diabetes should ever attempt a pregnancy. By the time I was three, she had gone blind.
How much of this I was aware of I cannot say; it was only many decades later, when I began to ask my relatives about their lives growing up that I got a more rounded picture of my mother’s life and death.
I was recently talking to someone whose parents do not want funerals when they die. Part of it is that they hate to see money being spent. I get that to a degree. A family shouldn’t spend money they can’t afford buying a fancy top-of-the-line casket or elaborate gravestone. But a funeral doesn’t have to cost a lot.
The other reason these folks don’t want funerals is because they figure that no one likes them and no one would come, anyway. That’s a depressing thought.
My parents said the same kinds of things; they didn’t think anyone would come.
The most interesting funeral I have been to was for a man who did not lead the most reputable life. No one from his family would go up and say anything about him, probably because they didn’t want to lie in church or speak ill of the dead. The priest didn’t know much about him, the only thing he could say was that the deceased was good at telling funny stories, which was true. The dead man had a couple of families (that we know of). The kids he had with his wife had his real last name. The kids he had with his mistress had his stage name as their last name. The priest thought the stage name was his real name and kept referring to the mistress as the wife. Yes, his actual wife and her kids were there. Fun times.