Wednesday, June 15, 2005

Another Round-Up

I noticed on the last installment on Catholic blogging at IgnatiusInsight (the question: What the problems with blogs?) that Jeff at Hallowed Ground says this:

"Blogging and blog reading can become an incredible waste of time. I think it is for most people, myself included. "

When you get really busy, you find out where you are 'wasting time'. This past week or so I have found that blogging and especially reading blogs has 'suffered'. Hopefully things are getting back to normal for a few days and I will be able to catch up a bit. (Speaking of Jeff - I note on his blog that he is out there doing something I wish I was doing this week - camping and fishing. We never did get up to the mountains this past spring. We have done some fishing. Hopefully more this week.)

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Here (scroll down to 'Home Funerals') is something I have talked about with Mrs. Curley. I really would like to have people taking turns praying for my soul all night long before my burial. We are so quick to shove death aside as an unpleasant, albeit necessary experience. Yet death is something we need to spend time on - in contemplation, in celebration, and yes in mourning. The death of a loved one is an ongoing opportunity to come closer to God. Where did I read so recently that death is not so much an end, but a transition into the continuation of our life? We can't have our heart in Heaven if we never think of death.

I also won't mind being buried somewhere in the backyard. (Mrs. Curley thinks I should be buried next to our deceased dog!). Seriously, it is easier to keep up a grave and remember to pray for a soul if it is not 5 miles (or more) down the road. I will need those prayers, so I want to be 'in the face' of my family as a constant reminder.

From 'Bethany', our small holding in Bethune...

Oremus pro invicem!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is something I have given much thought to. I don't wish to be embalmed. I want a simple wooden coffin, but I want "Credo in carnis resurrectionem" carved into the top. I want a Tridentine funeral mass, and I want a priest who will not hesitate to tell folks how desperately I need there constant prayers if I am ever to leave purgatory. I want people to leave with a fear of purgatory, for me and themselves. And I either want to be buried in my family's yard, or next to my father, in the only consecrated grave in that baptist churchyard.

Oh and if you are handy with tools, see this http://www.motherearthnews.com/do_it_yourself/2003_April_May/Handmade_Caskets

Jim Curley said...

Mr. Jennings: I am with you. I don't want some yahoo consoling my family from the pulpit with these fantasies that I'm in Heaven the day of my funeral. I want prayers, I want Masses. I want a homily on the purgatory.

I have always thought building my pine box - but I like the carving you would have on it.

alicia said...

I would want to be buried in sacred ground, somewhere that my family could visit and pray near. I have thought about possibly buying a casket from one of the monasteries that makes them - you can buy them ahead of time and if desired, put shelves in them for books so that it is useful even ahead of its ultimate use. I have told my family that I want a simple but faith filled funeral and have also told my husband what hymns I would really like. I am thinking that maybe I should write them down.
When my young cousin died last year, her family brought her body home from the hospital and prepared it themselves, and sat by her all night long. They are not catholic, not even particularly christian for the most part, but my cousin had been baptised and was attending an Anglican school, so I know that many of her freinds and teachers were praying for her - and she did have a christian funeral (but they opted for cremation, which I have told my family is absolutley out unless there is a valid fear of pestilence)
I am glad to be Catholic, where we don't consider it morbid to contemplate death and dying. I only hope that I don't have a sudden death, but rather one where my family and friends can gather around and read the prayers for the dying and where I can get anointing and viaticum/

Anonymous said...

Sitting up with the dead... Not too long ago, in my little valley in Alabama, no one would be expected to lie alone, waiting for interment. If a man died without family, even a known heathen, the little old ladies from the baptist or pentecostal churches made sure they got washed up proper and were sat with all night.

It isn't only we Catholics who can contemplate death without morbidity. I think Modern and Postmodern Man are alone in this.

As for hymns, one thing I made sure to get an opinion on from my catechist was the theological correctness of the Navy Hymn, "Eternal Father." I was a sailor, and would like to either enter or leave the Mass to this hymn. Otherwise, I want whatever everyone else is supposed to get. No more, no less.