Monday, July 2, 2012


BURY THE DEAD


INTRODUCTION

The title of my homily for this 13 Monday in Ordinary Time is, “Let the Dead Bury Their Dead!”

Let me repeat that. It’s the last message in today’s gospel. Jesus is finishing some comments about what it takes to follow him. He’s about to get into a boat to go to the other side of the Lake. He says to the crowd, “Let the dead bury their dead.” [Matthew 8:22]

It’s a very tough saying - no doubt about it.

Some think it’s more about folks hesitating to do something - because they are waiting for the day when their parents die. That could be years to come. In the meanwhile, they haven’t lived their life. Jewish law said there was an obligation to take care of the burial of one’s parents.

THINK ABOUT THAT SAYING

Think about those 6 words: “Let the dead bury their dead.”

I don’t know about you, but I heard that saying since I was a kid and from time to time I think about those words of Jesus - and not just when they are part of the readings at Mass.

How about you?  What have been your experiences of how you and others have dealt with death?

I remember hearing a story in a sermon from a long time ago. A mom lost her son in the Second World War. Every day she put fresh clothes on a chair in his bedroom next to his empty bed - and everyday she would wash the clothes that were sitting there from the day before. His room was kept as a shrine in memory of her lost son.

That takes energy - that takes time - to feel that pain - to wash those clothes which were never worn. Looking back I don’t remember the specific point the speaker was trying to make. What hit me was her need at some point to get over her son's death - and use her energy and time for the living.

In time I also learned that everyone has to do their grieving in their own way - and most of the time it’s not helpful for outsiders to tell the person feeling the inside pain: “Get over it!” I remember a wife telling me how angry she was at a priest who told her to get over the death of her husband. The priest said something like, “Enough already. Get on with your life.”  She said to me: “What did he know of marriage and love!”

We have all watched people and how different they are when it comes to grieving. We've all seen ourselves grieving differently for different people.

I always remember seeing a television documentary on how humans have evolved. It might have been Jacob Bronowski’s, The Ascent of Man or Civilisation by Kenneth Clark. Both were a wonderful series on TV and I went out and bought the books. In one of those programs, the commentator said something like: "It was a significant moment in the history of us humans when early people didn’t just throw the body of someone who died off the side of a migratory path and move on. No. They stopped to bury the dead person. They stopped to pause, to pray, to cry, and to leave a marker."

To be human is to do that. I get that. Father Joe Krastel loves western movies and he usually has the clicker and when commercials come on in a ballgame, he switches to the western channel. I feel woozy bad when someone is shot and killed and the group doesn’t stop to bury the dead person. I feel better when they stop to bury their dead - even if they lose time and another group is pursuing them. So I get that.

Isn’t that why folks often want read at the funeral of a loved one, Ecclesiastes 3: 1-8 - when the author says, “There is an appointed time for everything … a time to be born and a time to die … a time to weep and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance….”?

What have our family deaths taught us?

My sister Mary lost her 15 year old son Michael from cancer with only 4 days notice. I remember her telling me years later that the first stage takes 7 years and then there is the time after that.

When my dad died,  I cried. It was my first real death - so too my nephew Michael - so too my brother. I still have not cried at my mother’s death and that was back in 1987. I wonder why - perhaps because it was so violent and so sudden - in a hit and run accident - as she was walking to morning mass and then to work. Someone suggested listening to Irish music…. Time will tell....

So each of us has our own deaths. Each of us has our own private cemetery deep in the village or town or countryside of our soul or memory. And we go by it from time to time. And we visit it from time to time.

CONCLUSION

Today’s gospel - the last sentence in today’s gospel - those words of Jesus - “Let the dead bury their dead” - triggers these thoughts.

Two key thoughts. Mourn! It's part of what makes us human. It tells us how much we love and miss the people who have been part of our life. Secondly, at some point, we have to bury our dead. That doesn’t mean we don’t have the pictures on the top of our bureaus - the death cards in our prayer books - the conversations about our dead. But at some point, we have to bury our dead. That’s why there are cemeteries. That’s why those who keep the ashes of loved ones  in their house, sometimes say, “It’s time to bury the dead. It's time to move on to the other side of the lake."









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