November 2011 - 59
Luke describes the burial of Jesus
in detail. “And now a member of the Council arrived, a good and upright man
named Joseph. He had not consented to what the others had planned and carried
out. He came from Arimathaea, a Jewish town, and he lived in the hope of seeing
the kingdom of God. This man went to Pilate and asked
for the body of Jesus. He then took it down, wrapped it in a shroud and put it
in a tomb which was hewn in stone and which had never held a body. It was
Preparation day and the Sabbath was beginning to grow light. Meanwhile the women
who had come from Galilee with Jesus were following behind. They took note of the tomb and how
the body had been laid. Then they returned and prepared spices and
ointments” (Lk 23:50-56).
The horror with which the
crucifixion is described contrasts sharply with the tenderness with which the
evangelist portrays the entombment. Jesus, who was considered a criminal, is
buried with honour, unlike his fellow sufferers. Joseph of Arimathaea offered
his own tomb, hewn in stone. Everything had to be done quickly, as Passover was
approaching. The embalming was planned for after the Sabbath. The other
evangelists also mention the linen cloth in which the body was wrapped. John,
who is known for his attention to detail, also speaks of the cloth that covered
the face of Jesus, in addition to the shroud. This is the historical basis for
the Shroud of Turin, which was displayed for veneration for a short period of
time in 2010, and the sudarium or ‘sweat cloth’ with the Santo Volto of
Manoppello in Abruzzo, Italy. Both bear the same face of
Jesus.
The seventh physical work of mercy,
to bury the dead, does not originate from Jesus’ judgment criteria, but from the
Book of Tobit, often called the little Old Testament book of good works. “I gave
my bread to the hungry and clothes to those who lacked them; and I buried, when
I saw them, the bodies of my country-folk thrown over the walls of
Nineveh. I also buried those who were
killed by Sennacherib” (Tb 1:17-18). As he sat down to eat, he was
looking forward to invite a poor countryman. When he learned that a man was
strangled to death in the marketplace, he left the table to go and bury him.
Even when the government forbade him to bury the dead, he went through with this
work of mercy. “When the sun was down, I went and dug a grave and buried him. My
neighbours laughed and said, 'See! He is not afraid any more. Once before he had
to flee, yet here he is, beginning to bury the dead again'” (Tb
2:7-8).
Tobit’s example will probably have
inspired the medieval Cellites, later called Alexians, to bury the dead in the
cities during the plague epidemics. They were left in the streets, and nobody
was prepared to bury them, for fear of contagion. These brothers got a new
nickname; they were called ‘Schokkebroers’ or ‘Shaky Brothers’ in English,
probably because they frequently had a little alcohol to protect themselves from
contagion and so at night they would be shaking and stumbling down the city
streets. Their motivation, however, was deeply religious and was inspired by the
commandment of charity to love everyone and treat everyone with respect. This
love does not stop with death, but the body, like a temple of the Holy Spirit, as Paul
said it, deserves a tribute and a worthy final resting place. And so, the Church
cultivates the tradition to have special attention for burying the dead,
including those without a family or without means. To this day, there are
groups, particularly in the United
States, who arrange funerals for homeless
people, lonely people, and poor people. In
Sri Lanka I was a guest of the Sisters of the
Poor in Batticaloa. Like in several other places in the world, they run a rest
home for the poorest of the poor. Many of these people literally have no one,
and thanks to the care of these sisters they can spend their old age in peace.
When one of the residents died, I saw how the sisters respectfully and carefully
laid the man out at the mortuary. The other elderly came to pay their last
respects. A few hours later, they celebrated the Eucharist and the sisters took
him to the graveyard where they buried him themselves and placed a simple wooden
cross on his grave. This man had no one in this world, yet he was entrusted to
the earth like a human being.
It also reminds me of Mother Teresa
who said the following about her experience in the relief of those who were
dying: “There was the man we picked up from the drain, half-eaten by worms and,
after we had brought him to the home, he only said, ‘I have lived like an animal
in the street, but I am going to die as an angel, loved and cared for.’ It was
so wonderful to see the greatness of that man who could speak like that without
blaming anybody, without comparing anything. Like an angel – this is the
greatness of people who are spiritually rich even when they are materially
poor.” Helping people to die with dignity, showing them that they are worth the
effort to be cared for and loved in spite of their past; this was the special
mission that Mother Teresa received in Calcutta. “Maybe,” she said at another
occasion, “if I hadn’t picked up that one person I wouldn’t have picked up those
thousands of others. This is bringing the poor to Jesus and carrying Jesus to
the poor.”
We can add the care for the dying to
this work of mercy. In the 1960s, a new form of care was born: palliative care.
When curative care ends and there is no cure, there is always the care for the
person who is dying. We often heard that people who were dying were put in
separate hospital rooms and the nurse would avoid going in as there was nothing
left to do. Others would undergo all sorts of medical procedures that would
prolong life for only a short period of time and cause nothing but trouble. They
wanted to prove that they were willing to go to any length to help the patient,
as it were. On the other hand, the advancing treatment possibilities for cancer
among others helped people for only a short period of time but left them with
great pain and suffering in the long run. A new approach was required, focused
on the suppression of pain and additional burdens, without having to
anaesthetize the patient or place him in a coma. The legendary English
physician, Dr. Cicely Saunders started London’s first hospice, Saint
Christopher’s, which became the model of an entire new movement later on,
palliative care. In Belgium, it was Sister Leontine who
established the first palliative department at
Saint John’s Hospital in
Brussels. Today, these hospices are found in
many places and several hospitals have opened special palliative wards.
Everything is aimed at increasing the patients’ comfort and preserving the
quality of life as much as possible, and, at the same time, at quietly preparing
the patient for death. The possibility for the family to be there
unrestrictedly, and even stay the night, is a very strong point and gives the
patient the opportunity, albeit in an adapted environment, to be with his family
in the final moments of his life. The request for active life termination, which
is heard in these departments and stems from the unbearable and hopeless
suffering that the patient endures, often fades away once the pain is relieved.
It was not a request for life termination but a cry for help to be relieved of
the pain. Palliative care is a big step forward in the matter of dying with
human dignity.
Burying the dead is also a topical
issue in countries where bodies have been dumped in mass graves due to
situations of war or genocides without people being able to pay their last
respects. In Rwanda, every discovery of a mass grave is
an opportunity to have a ceremony to disinter the remains, rebury them and give
them a suitable headstone. Even if the remains cannot be identified, they are
treated with respect. They attempt at restoring that which was done in a cruel
and inhumane way during the genocide. In the light of the commandment of
neighbourly love, which tells us that true love is expressed in the total
absence of reciprocity, burying the dead adds an extra dimension. No, we cannot
count on reciprocity here, and love emerges in its purest form. Burying the dead
is therefore justly to be considered a work of neighbourly love. In Western
countries, there is a growing tradition to leave the entire funeral ritual to
specialised companies. Even the laying out of the deceased’s body is done by
so-called specialists, and in case they pass away at home, the deceased are
immediately brought to a special funeral home. This is where people can pay
their last respects before the actual funeral service. We probably cannot go
back to the old days when the deceased’s body was laid out at home, the shutters
were drawn, and a wooden cross was placed on the front of the house. Friends and
family would have the opportunity to say goodbye to the deceased in his or her
home, sometimes for several days. How fortunate I am to have witnessed the
passing of my grandmother at her home, on her deathbed. If you ask young people
now if they have ever seen a dead person, many will give a negative answer.
Disease, suffering, and death are safely stored in hospitals and funeral home,
and have become taboo. The newly created parting rituals in crematoria that are
increasingly replacing the traditional funeral service, are a deterioration
because people no longer accompany the deceased to the final resting place. In
many cases, they paused at what the deceased meant for this world, however the
reference to the afterlife is missing completely. It has become an end without
prospects; one literally goes up in smoke.
Burying the dead is saying goodbye
to a loved one, and continuing to live with this person in a new way. “Death is
naught. I have only passed to the other side. I am me. You are you. That which
we were for each other, we are still. (…) You see, everything is fine. You
will rediscover my heart. In it, you will rediscover pure
tenderness…”
Saint Augustine wrote. The memory of the departed
for those who believe should be more than a continued existence in the minds of
those who remain. Across death, the deceased has already entered eternal life,
the limitations of time and space have ceased to exist, he or she can be with us
in a whole new way, transcending time and space. We cannot experience this now
as we are still connected to time and space but we believe that those who made
the transition can have a place in our life, even more intimate than before: not
like it used to be, exclusively during times when we were physically in this
same room, but always and transcending the distance that was caused by
corporality. Praying for the dead, another work of mercy, stems from the work of
burying the dead: the burial of the body but the continuation of life with the
soul.
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