Comments for Getting Rid of the Body at http://www.thecatholicthing.org , comment 1 to 11 out of 11 comments http://www.thecatholicthing.org Wed, 22 May 2013 03:40:13 +0100 FeedCreator 1.7.3 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7401 Dear Randall and Louise, my sentiments - Exactly. Life is full of dignity and death should be as well. Beautifully and necessarily said. Thank you. - debby Thu, 14 Jul 2011 12:17:15 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7398 For some good laughs, read Mary Roach's "Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers". And while you're at it, her "Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife". Funny as, well, Hell. - Yezhov Thu, 14 Jul 2011 05:42:13 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7394 Ah, Mr. Grump, but that fire did not consume. - Louise Wed, 13 Jul 2011 11:19:53 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7393 Hey, Louise: Don't forget, the LORD thought fire was a good way to announce himself : ) Exodus 3:2 There the angel of the LORD appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. - Grump Wed, 13 Jul 2011 09:46:22 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7392 I have witnessed another form of burial--of sorts: i.e., being put in a drawer (of sorts) and rolled into a long, high wall of drawers (of sorts). I found THAT creepy. I couldn't make out what symbolism or meaning lay behind that practice--except, of course, utilitarianism. I dislike cremation for the simple reason that the body created by God is treated as trash. (When I was young, my chore was to burn the household trash in the side lot, so I associate burning with trash. As you said, nobody burns things of value.) Mr. Yezhov, you must be a city boy. To live in a rural, farming area, is to see decay everyday--whether grass clippings, tree stumps, or animal carcasses. Worms, too, were created by God and exist for His purposes and plan. Even Hamlet knew that when he described the process of a king passing through the gullet of some creature or other. I thought of that when we added humus to our tomato plants. The humus came from the composter where we had put out dead sheep (whom we had loved and cared for for a dozen years). It is all part of the economy of God--the oneness of His creation. Granted, we don't eat vegetables enhanced by composted human bodies because human beings have a unique place in God's creation. But we should not be repulsed because they are subject to the same rules and the same physical processes that He established. Human = humus, after all. God bless the monks who make pine-box coffins. They live in the real world. Do you think that the sterility that is part and parcel of modern human relationships and interaction is also a factor in the increased use of cremation or perpetual storage in a wall cabinet? A denial of life in all its reality and messiness? Homosexual acts are sterile of fertility. Contraception is sterile of fertility. Antiseptic scrubs on every child's hands and every kitchen counter create sterility and the inability to deal with real life, What is more sterile than fire? If we cannot face life directly, it's no wonder that we cannot face death and substitute teddy bears for prayers at grave sites.. - Louise Wed, 13 Jul 2011 09:01:46 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7391 Also, if your spouse pre-deceases you, do you want to contemplate his/her corpse becoming a slowly rotting worm farm? - Yezhov Wed, 13 Jul 2011 07:16:20 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7390 Quidem. Great, great column. - W.E. Wed, 13 Jul 2011 05:46:00 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7387 Cremation is creepy, indeed, but when you can be disposed of for $985 including a nice urn vs. 10 grand for an elaborate funeral, then it's obvious that the reason is pure economics. Randall, I understand the symbolism argument, but in the final analysis what's the difference between a pile of old bones and a heap of ashes? After the game is over, the king and the pawn wind up in the same box. - Grump Wed, 13 Jul 2011 04:14:36 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7386 I agree with the overall content and Fr. Benedict's comment, as well, but is having embalming fluid pumped into our dead bodies, being placed on satin puffery in a grossly over-priced, over-veneered, balky coffin the "Catholic way"? For crying out loud, the monks in Louisiana have found a partial solution with simple pine coffins (which are priced over $1000 yet cheap compared to the secular industry) and they are chest deep in litigation because they are selling so well. The American way should not dictate how we Catholics bury ourselves. - Jpac Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:56:17 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7385 Zoning regulations, of course, prevent most parishes from keeping a churchyard cemetery. But this discussion highlights precisely why the Church oughtn't to allow cremation: no Church law is in place because of God's limitations. Ecclesiastical laws exist to teach us about the Truth, an entirely different purpose that is not served by the present latitudinarian approach to this question. - Titus Wed, 13 Jul 2011 03:43:31 +0100 http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2011/getting-rid-of-the-body.html#comment-7383 This is the truth that "dare not speak it's name." Thank you. Cremation is NOT the Catholic way. - Fr. Benedict Tue, 12 Jul 2011 19:18:34 +0100