mo(u)rning

A very good piece with Pastor Mark D. Roberts on HughHewitt, discussing the Virgina Tech murders. One thing Hewitt does I like is read the names of some of the deceased, their bios, their life story. It's important people murdered are not forgotten for what they gave in life, even though they have been cut short. Especially so short for those as young as students. Evil wins when the good they have done is lost.

The main point Roberts keeps stressing that I want to hold up is that Americans are not good mourners. People want immediately to move to being healed and ok. Our society does not leave bodies in the house to be mourned over for days. We hide death in our society. It's not something that can be consumed. We don't do the consuming. We are the consumed in death.

The only way to turn death into a consumption model is to turn funerals into "life celebrations" or "masses of resurrection." I'm not a big fan of these. At least not in substitution for a funeral or some recognition of the sorrow of death, the inherent tragedy of life. If someone wants to have such a PowerPoint presentation of a Life Lived, after the time of mourning. What in the old days were post-funeral meals at the family home.

Roberts is right: that there is time to be sitting in emptiness. Even Job's friends, not as smart as they are, sit with him in silence for days before saying anything.

This type of death is not a natural one, if that is the right term. It is an unjust and cruel. The inability to be with people in their suffering, loss, wanting to make everything ok is a symptom of the dis-ease within ourself. That is about us--not them which is what anything should be about now.