Beginning and ending well, a very simple concept that can be applied to jobs, family life and of course our life and our death. We think here of Revelation 21 where the Apostle John quotes God in his vision saying: I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. For the Christian our death is very similar to our birth, for in death we are birthed back to the one who created us. What we believe about death is critical to our Christian life. As C.S. Lewis said: “Yes, autumn is the best of the seasons; and I’m not sure that old age isn’t the best part of life!”
Well our dear Tigger Smythe lived life like the Tigger for which she was nicknamed from A.A. Milne and Winnie the Pooh fame. She hopped, she danced, and she lived the zest of life! Over the course of her full and inspirational life, she served as:
- Wife to Henry for nearly 60 years
- Mother of 4 boys
- Member of the choir for decades
- Flower Guild chair
- Tower bell ringer through the keyboard
Her funeral reflected that incredible spirit. Specifically her burial. Following her funeral at St. Michael’s and because her husband was Presbyterian, the burial followed at 2nd Presbyterian Church on Meeting Street. The beautiful thing about her burial was that the pall bearers and family exclusively buried the casket. The staff from the funeral home didn’t touch the shovels until every morsel of dirt was put in place over the casket. Why is that important? Families need to bury their own! There is an important catharsis that is both spiritual and physical that aids the grieving process.
We live in a sterile age when it comes to death and often we let the funeral home do too much. All too often families and friends leave after the prayers and the casket isn’t even fully in the ground yet, and the whole pile is covered with that green plastic turf which can often symbolize not dealing with the whole experience of death.
A healthy grieving process demands that we physically involve ourselves in the burial of loved ones as a way of bringing finality to the earthly life of that person. I firmly believe we would have more emotional wholeness if people learned to bury their own. The blessing of this burial was that during the 40 minutes of the burial, the clergy read psalms and prayers, but then suddenly from all over the churchyard impromptu spirituals rang out by voices that were quickly joined by other voices! It was amazing. To Tiggers sons David, George, Henry and Guy (RIP) and their families I say well done good and faithful servants!
~ The Rev. Al Zadig, Jr.+