"Cloud of Witnesses iii" by Ugandan artist Eria "Sane" Nsubuga,
Mixed Media, 2007.
"For all the saints..." began the service this morning marking the Feast of All Saints' on the Kalendar. We named the faithful departed in 2009 during the Mass and we gave thanks for the on-going witness of all the "little S-s" saints in our daily lives. We even had a baptism today, shocking only that this parish would opt to actually follow a rubric on this topic! Anyways, I digress.
Feasting with the Saints. I can just imagine that now. My grandparents, cousins, and other friends whom have died and risen in glory with Christ above, eating their fill, celebrating the goodness of God and God's creation. I wonder, especially today, what they are saying to themselves about me. "Oh Lord, there goes Chad again..."
One thing that I miss with newer parish churches is the lack of a parish cemetery. In most parish churches in England, you cannot take one step without coming in contact with a memorial stone or engraving of some kind. There's even something commemorating whenever the Sovereign comes inside! You cannot help but notice the great cloud of witnesses in those bastions of stone and glass. And yet in the States, we tend to want to keep our dead as far away from us as possible. "Why would you want to clutter up a nice church yard with grave stones?" Now to be fair, there are plenty of churches here that have cemeteries--most tend to be historic though. Many have adopted columbaria as a method of depositing the ashes of loved ones into hermetically sealed containers in a church wall somewhere. But I wonder why we fear the dead so much? We don't even like to say the word "death" or "dying." Instead, many opt for the politeness found in "passing away," and the like. Our culture fears death, the one certain thing that we can count on that never requires its software to be updated.
For me, I've decided, I want to be cremated and scattered. No need for a marker or stone anywhere. "Why clutter up the earth with something that has passed away?" I had to get that one in there. But seriously, I'm a firm believer in being "green" on this issue. I just see it as a waste to go through the expense and hassle of it all. Death is certain, and yet death is not the end. Resurrection in Christ is our hope and it is what I look forward to follow. Nothing will be left behind, all of creation is moving towards its fulfillment in the Trinity. You can count on that.
Feasting with the Saints. I can just imagine that now. My grandparents, cousins, and other friends whom have died and risen in glory with Christ above, eating their fill, celebrating the goodness of God and God's creation. I wonder, especially today, what they are saying to themselves about me. "Oh Lord, there goes Chad again..."
One thing that I miss with newer parish churches is the lack of a parish cemetery. In most parish churches in England, you cannot take one step without coming in contact with a memorial stone or engraving of some kind. There's even something commemorating whenever the Sovereign comes inside! You cannot help but notice the great cloud of witnesses in those bastions of stone and glass. And yet in the States, we tend to want to keep our dead as far away from us as possible. "Why would you want to clutter up a nice church yard with grave stones?" Now to be fair, there are plenty of churches here that have cemeteries--most tend to be historic though. Many have adopted columbaria as a method of depositing the ashes of loved ones into hermetically sealed containers in a church wall somewhere. But I wonder why we fear the dead so much? We don't even like to say the word "death" or "dying." Instead, many opt for the politeness found in "passing away," and the like. Our culture fears death, the one certain thing that we can count on that never requires its software to be updated.
For me, I've decided, I want to be cremated and scattered. No need for a marker or stone anywhere. "Why clutter up the earth with something that has passed away?" I had to get that one in there. But seriously, I'm a firm believer in being "green" on this issue. I just see it as a waste to go through the expense and hassle of it all. Death is certain, and yet death is not the end. Resurrection in Christ is our hope and it is what I look forward to follow. Nothing will be left behind, all of creation is moving towards its fulfillment in the Trinity. You can count on that.
