HaysooChreesto!

This is part rant, part advice asking that I kind of already know the answer to.

My wife's grandparents are both expected to die soon. They've both been on the verge for a few years now as the indignities of very old age have taken the worst kind of toll. But I think this is it.
My wife's family is very religous and they don't handle death well at all. They also know I'm an atheist and that I won't be praying. But for their sensibilities I have decided to at least bow my head when it comes time to pray to acknowledge that I feel for their loss. While some may see that as some sort of spineless capitulation towards the supernatural on my part, I disagree. I think it's just the considerate and tactful thing to do.

Both funerals will be of the Pentecostal variety. We're talkin' Holy Rollers here. I'm hoping that the speaking in tongues and outrageous carrying on doesn't manifest itself. But if it does, I'll live. I just don't want to laugh. The memory of being a child in church where you're not supposed to laugh, but where it's so hard not to comes to mind.

But why is it, that people of such faith such as my in-laws take death so hard? If I believed in eternal life and a benevolent god who's standards had been met by the deceased, then I would only grieve for the abscence of that persons presence. I would be able to take comfort that they were "in a better place now". But both grandparents have been senile and in the most undignified of health for at least 5 years now. They don't even recognize their loved ones anymore, they don't know where they are, and sometimes even who they are. Still, the entire family, including my wife are devastated as though this is a shocking misfortune.

I guess I just have a different perspective on death than most when it comes to the elderly. Well before the time of my grandparents deaths, I had already accepted that they weren't going to be around much longer. So when they did die, I wasn't devastated. I was sad sure, but for me, their funerals bittersweet but far more sweet than bitter, and my memories of them were and still are among my most treasured and I smile when I think of them. I've also already come to grips with the fact that before I die, I will see many people I love and care about pass away. I'm not dreading it. Barring the loss of one of my children or the unexpected loss of my wife or close relatives, I'm okay with death. I have to be. It's gonna happen.

So I guess that's what's puzzling to me about the way so many religous people react to the passing of a loved one-especially one that's been expected to die. I'm an atheist and I'm okay with the deaths of others and myself, but they're people of faith and they're not. It's not that I don't sympathize and empathize. Maybe I'm just weird.

Solsticin

You are certainly not weird. I take great comfort knowing that a person's pain is over. I think funerals should be happy times to some degree. Granted, you will miss that person of course, and that is sad. I've always thought a funeral should be a celebration of what that person meant to the people around them.

Or maybe we are both weird?

I gotta tell you though, when my Uncle died about 8 months ago I had a hard time with it. They had a ridiculously religious funeral complete with a 'get right with god NOW' message (in fact, that WAS the funeral!!!). My uncle was a homosexual and not to happy about church-types (as he called them). Having a religious funeral, to me, seemed like a slap in the face. I really, really, REALLY wanted to interupt the preacher and tell him to get bent. It was all I could do to shut up. It would have been disrespectful to the others in the funeral, so I held my tongue. Pushing your F'ing agenda during a funeral is LOW and down right dispicable.

Funerals are for the living I suppose. The dead are gone and will not see it anyway.

Ab_Normal

My pappy, from whom I learned to be irreligious, would always ask the same question of the TV set when the news would show the sobbing relatives saying, "They're with Jesus now." He'd lean forward and say, "If they're with Jesus, shouldn't you be happy?"

*snif* I miss the old fart...

Albion

Maybe people who consider eternal life so important are doing so because they're terribly afraid of death. It seems to loom a lot larger in Christian lives than in nontheist lives.

southernhybrid

Hello Lamma,

As a nurse who has worked with the elderly for over 25 years, I don't find that people react in the way that your family does. Most of the families that I've served have come to terms very nicely about the deaths of their elderly loved ones.

My own parents are fundy Baptists and they were relieved to see their own parents die after suffering from long illnesses. This in spite of the fact that they didn't think my grandparents were "saved" and heaven bound. Sometimes there are cultural considerations in how people react to death but I don't think religion is that much of an issue.


I've never seen my mother show one tiny bit of fear of death and I think that I learned that from her despite the fact that she is Baptist and I'm an atheist.

Most of my elderly clients become very accepting of death as they reach the point where their quality of life begins to diminish rapidly.

Some Xians fear death and some atheists fear death. We all have our own little fears if we are honest with ourselves.

HaysooChreesto!

Southernhybrid, I get what you're saying and I'll agree that most people whether theists or non, usually handle a situation like this in an accepting manner. That's why it's curious to me that this is not the case with my inlaws.
It's almost like there's a big show of emotion on their parts to communicate how devastated they all are. I feel like I'm being unfair in some way. I don't want to sound terribly insensitive. But there's seems to be some kind of conditioned response with them that triggers their reactions in these situations. This isn't the first one. Another grandparent in basically the same straits passed away a few years ago and the same thing happened.

Maybe that's why I'm inclined to think that their Pentecostal background plays a role in the way they cope with death.

Whatever the case may be, I need to respect their feelings and I will.

Castaway

I don't know which churchs qualify as Pentecostal so maybe my experiences and observations aren't exactly relevant to your situation, but I wondered if your wife's family expressed strong emotion because emotions are encouraged within their church.

Where I was raised almost everyone was some flavor of Baptist - Regular, Old Regular, Freewill, Independent, Southern etc. As a child and as a teenager, I was what you would probably label a Holy Roller, a fundy, but we didn't call our church Pentecostal. I never heard anyone speak in tongues, but the church I attended was not quiet, people spoke, cried, yelled and expressed strong emotions during the service.

No one in my former church was ever discouraged from speaking, witnessing, yelling, chanting or crying during services. If anything, members were encouraged to be emotional. Emotions were the evidence of one's faith; they demonstrated the sincerity of one's belief in god.

Emotions were valued in my fundamentalist church. So I wonder if the emotions your wife's family expresses are, as you say a conditioned response, their learned way of expressing the genuineness of their grief.

While the depth of emotions they express may seem extreme to you in this situation, I think your respectful attitude towards them is the right way to handle this situation.

Castaway

SharonDee

More than that, I think the Pentecostal background plays a role in how some of them cope with anything.

My daughter's paternal grandmother is a Pentecostal whose own kids protect her from any unpleasant information. They learned to do this long ago to prevent her from going into hysterics and crying out to her god to deliver her. As you can imagine, such scenes helped no one and weren't conducive to handling whatever had to be done in a stressful situation.

When my husband wanted to adopt my daughter several years ago, we were having trouble tracking down her sperm donor and (reluctantly) contacted his mother for help. She was not happy about our plans to strip Tony of his fatherhood and pleaded with me to reconsider... this after not having seen or talked to or contacted my daughter in any way for most of her (then) thirteen years; they'd not even shown the inclination. Mallory hardly knows who they are.

Anyway, once the adoption went through I made a point to call her and assure her this needn't change anything about her relationship to her granddaughter. She was still welcomed and even encouraged to visit or phone any time she liked. But the woman couldn't stop sobbing, "I feel like you've taken a knife and cut out my heart!"

That was the last contact we ever had from anyone in the family. For all the wailing and gnashing of teeth, no one seems to be particularly perturbed that they've lost a beautiful and talented granddaughter/niece/daughter.