Monday, October 4, 2010

Mourning our dead

Question: Is the fact that religious people weep at funerals evidence of their covert atheism? If they truly and wholeheartedly believe that their loved ones simply moved on to a better life, why are they crying?

The standard answer is that they mourn a heartbreaking loss--their loved ones might still exist somewhere, but they'll never see them again, at least not in familiar circumstances.

For my own subjective feelings, there's a difference. I would feel a lot better than I actually do if I were deeply convinced that my grandmother and my uncle have simply gone on a trip somewhere, even if they were never coming back. And it does seem to me that believers mourn their dead the same way that unbelievers do: as if the dead were no longer present, here or anywhere else. But maybe it's just me.

1 comment:

  1. An interesting question to ask. I wonder if this could be balanced by the relative emphasis that believers place on life vs. after-life. For example, if believers thought that only the after-life mattered, and that life incarnate is just a prelude to it, then no, perhaps they shouldn't really be so damn sad. Then again, if believers think that life incarnate matters a great deal and that some threshold must be crossed before death (as we know it) occurs, they might be quite sad to see a loved one not fulfill his/her [insert goal here].

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