Why Jessica Mitford was wrong

Theology Today, Jan 1999 by Long, Thomas G

Second, Mitford's broad axe attack is not nuanced enough to look beneath a cultural custom like viewing the body to discover its underlying motivations. Why would people want to view the body of the deceased? For Mitford, the only possible answer is morbid curiosity. What she cannot understand is that, in many religious traditions, death dramatically changes, but does not utterly destroy, the relationship with the deceased, and the rituals of the funeral serve in part to make the transition between one form of relationship and another. In this transitional period, the body of the deceased takes on an iconographic quality. More directly, when a grieving family wants "mama to look nice" it is not because they want to satisfy anyone's need to leer at the dead, but because they have the deep sense, shared by people in virtually every culture, that something of the relationship endures beyond death and they have the heartfelt desire to treat their dead with dignity and respect.

Until quite recently, Christian funerals, like many human death rituals, were built on the underlying metaphor of the journey of the deceased from this world to the next. In the case of Christianity, the deceased was traveling not to the land of the dead but into the presence of the living God, not over the River Styx but across the Jordan into the land of promise, flowing with milk and honey. For Christians, the deceased was not a ghoul to be feared nor an evil spirit to be warded off, but a saint to be respected, honored, loved, and accompanied with psalms, hymns, and prayers the last steps of the way (in the earliest Christian funerals, even given the kiss of peace). The dead body was neither a mere shell to be discarded as rubbish nor the totality of the person to be clutched and preserved in desperation, but a tangible sign, like the eucharistic bread, of God's gift of life.

Christian rituals of death have varied from age to age and from culture to culture, but in all times and places they have expressed the conviction that a saint is "traveling on." Some Christians-but not all-dress the deceased in a white baptismal robe for the journey. Some Christians-but not all-stay awake with the body in the hours before the funeral, telling stories and sharing memories, not so much to guard the body or to shoo away the forces of evil, but as fellow pilgrims on the path, as a symbol of the communion of the saints and the unbroken connection with the saint who is "passing on," not just passed away. Some Christians-but not all-open the coffin and look at the face of the deceased, perhaps several times in the course of the funeral and burial, not because they are morbidly curious about death but because they are saying farewell to a sister or brother. Some Christians-but not all-carry the coffin into the sanctuary, pausing at stations to recount the liturgy of baptism. Some Christians-but not all-walk or march or ride in procession to the place of burial, giving shape to the conviction that the deceased is journeying to the other shore, to the "land that is brighter than day." Some Christians-but not all-sing "From earth's wide bounds, from ocean's farthest coast, through gates of pearl streams in the countless host" and others sing "When we meet on that beautiful shore" and still others sing "O when the saints, go marchin' in," but all Christians, in their own ways, mark the milestones of the saintly journey and the progress of a pilgrim toward "a safe lodging, and a holy rest, and peace at the last."