Burial is just a tradition. In fact I think the Gospels prove my belief in a need to have our understanding and “traditions” upended every now and again. That’s pretty simple, too — and more clearly un-scriptural than cremation. It is certainly possible to believe in absolute, objective truth without accepting the notion that all truth is propositional, i,e., communicable in syllogisms. Jesus The martyrs had burning pressed upon them and most would have chosen (if given a choice) long lives with Christian burials at the end of them. Great Britain and Japan, where cremation is the law. For it suggests that we … To renew His creation, the Creator becomes a part of the very creation If you are R.C., you can’t make this claim, as any authority you have is trumped by Paul VI. Most importantly I did not mean a new denomination or sect. Fire was associated with judgment, therefore, it would be difficult for the Israelites to relate cremation with any positive significance. Or when you’re semi-literate. Though most religions do permit cremation, some don’t, such as Islam and Orthodox Judaism. So no, I do not accept that God is any respecter of nationality, and the OT example of Irsael as the Chosen People is one limited to the Old Testament era for the necessary purpose of preparing an ancestry for Christ, and soil in which the seed of the Gospel would be planted. Beyond that, I don’t know what where God is leading me. Speaking of presumptuousness, which Christian teachings/practices are the universal ones? Even if you look at the Old Testament Hebrews, some were saved and some damned by their own actions, not because they were members of the Chosen People, or the Chosen People Fallen. I feel like I haven’t noticed you posting as much lately? If you’re not a Christian this is irrelevant (although if you are a lover of place you should have other reasons to want to be buried in the ground which nourished you). The decision of “why cremate” is an individual and personal one, including whether you choose cremation with a memorial service or a direct cremation (also called a simple cremation). Nations are definitely not abstractions of the human language, they are living organisms. Could James Matthew Wilson clear this up for me? You so eloquently stated here what we tried desperately to articulate to our family upon the recent death of a loved one. Do you mean a la Joseph Smith, or in some other sense? I would be fine just changing that: “It is highly likely that God is not perfectly described.” It’s not a question of whether it perfectly describes God. What Does the Bible Say About Attending Church? I liked this essay, Dr. Harvey, but you should have mentioned something about Philip Sherrard. bieszczady noclegi wetlina , http://spaniewsudetach.net/nastolatki-na-gorskich-szlakach.html , domki letniskowe nad jeziorem pomorskie , szczecin noclegi , http://spaniewsudetach.net/telefon-komorkowy-w-gorach.html , noclegi mediolan tanio , jaroslawiec noclegi tanie , http://spaniewsudetach.net/gdzie-znajdziemy-odpowiednie-spanie.html , katowice pokoje do wynajecia. In practice, tradition is indeed a compelling argument, and I agree that the burden of proof should be on Christians wanting to move from burial to cremation. If God could not do this, then all believers who have died in a fire are without hope of receiving their heavenly bodies. You are simply repeating the same arrogant and uncharitable assertions — people only support cremation on a “modernist whim.”. Christians are cremated only because they hold weak views of the body and death, and have no strong hope in the Resurrection? Certainly this statement is at times true (though I don’t advise any literal attempts at verifying it). The Russian Orthodox church allows cremation. For the record – in some species fire is actually a precursor to germination. Cremation is a method of final disposition of a dead body through burning ().. Cremation may serve as a funeral or post-funeral rite and as an alternative to the burial or interment of an intact dead body. One can see in this miracle an echo of Genesis However, it's not unusual for Christians to have concerns about cremation. You don’t get to choose to cremate. us new creatures and to transform our bodies in anticipation of the renewed Some believers object to the practice of cremation on the basis it does not recognize that one day God will resurrect our … Other than pure sentiment, I fail to see any difference between interring a body to be eaten by worms and cremating a body. Buried bodies decompose, of course. Jesus didn’t, you know, leave his discarded life-suit rotting in a tomb like so much refuse. I admit to being surprised that there are folks who think we have a religious duty to be buried. Well, I guess I will trust the authority of those who work in organ donation over the assertion of someone in a comment thread on the internet, but if you prefer whole-body donation, then use that scenario. And yes, I do believe the ancient tradition that the Church supplants Israel as the Chosen People in this regard– though that is no comment on God’s relationship with today’s Jews. Perhaps we should be expecting another massive shift in our conscious understanding? Why I am a Member of the Permanent Opposition, Warnings Heeded and Unheeded: A Review of Live Not by Lies, Brass Spittoon: Ken Myers on Three Decades (almost) of Mars Hill Audio, An Artistic Ecosystem: A Review of Makoto Fujimura’s Culture Care, Justice, Sovereignty, and the Throwaway Culture: Reading Charles Camosy, http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/organ-donation/FL00077, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/13/nyregion/13burial.html?src=me&ref=general, http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/reportmessage.cfm?comment_id=13435&entry_id=2957, http://spaniewsudetach.net/nastolatki-na-gorskich-szlakach.html, http://spaniewsudetach.net/telefon-komorkowy-w-gorach.html, http://spaniewsudetach.net/gdzie-znajdziemy-odpowiednie-spanie.html, New ANAMNESIS Symposium: “Views on Hawthorne, Simms, History, and Progress.”, On Being a Worthy Heir of the Agrarian Contrarians. Are you really trying to claim that God saves people or leaves them to damnation on account of group membership? Precondition, probably not. In some countries, including India and Nepal, cremation on an open-air pyre is an ancient tradition. In scripture, God worked through nations, spoke to nations, punished nations. At the same time, I do not think the practice fundamentally unChristian or heterodox. I prefer it simply because my people are buried. So much for finding common ground! Quick, clean disposal by fire is sometimes preferred. If it’s against your … One of the great ironies of our vastly improved technologies of transportation and communication is that a peripatetic Okie can admire and hope to adopt the cultural practices of Tibetans. “Nations” as we understand them are a very modern concept. As a matter of history the Greeks* and Romans did not allow for multiple simultaneous wives and that “tradtion” became normative in Christianity simply by cultural osmosis in the early Church. Thus “traditions” should not always be considered “of God” and immutable. Christian Views on Cremation –Is Death a Negative Event Death has always been accepted as a negative event. Beginning of life, end of life, it’s all part of the culture of death. It is the ultimate mystery of our redemption that He will call us back from the grave. In response to much of the strange energy this post has provoked in the comments, one might recommend the following: Whether you call yourself a Buddhist, or pretend not to be a gnostic, take a deep breath, look in the mirror, and remind yourself: “I have a soul, and it is ordered to a particular body. But it gets messy. Mr. Harvey asserts, based on one conversation, that Christians who cremate “are motivated by a heterodox view of the body or of death, a kind of latent Gnosticism that assumes the immortal soul will have no more to do this body.”. If you are thinking cremation … Stay tuned. Dan, if what you demand is a common place for different perspectives on questions of “place, limits, liberty”, then you are naturally going to come across, from time to time — some times more than others — perspectives with which you disagree. Webmaster's comment (bias alert): To deny a Catholic burial seems to me to … The Islamic faith also forbids cremation. Primarily, and hopefully to draw myself closer to what you are saying, because I do believe that the Spirit is at work in the world’s institutions, and that, against the resilient force of human restlessness and rebellion, is guiding the congregation of the faithful toward its eschatalogical fulfillment. it also says that the current creation will undergo fire It’s nonense to say that Russia or France or the United States will be saved– what do you even mean by that? And I’d like to be planted in the soil of our farm, as some of them are. glorified. All flesh and blood bodies eventually decay and become like dust in the earth. Mostly I am concerned with this fatal perversion of “truth” that is weakening and destroying the Church. Of course, it happens all the time. Crwiley responded very graciously and helped me understand where he was coming from. The heavenly body is a new, spiritual body, and not the old body of flesh and blood. […] My previous essay, therefore, is an attempt to understand how this tradition has been lost. This is uncharitable, uninformed, and outright foolish. They think Easter is about “life after death”, not the new creation. And since Eliot has been brought up, it’s worth paraphrasing him here, since this line well sums up for me our present situation (and lines like “only a flicker over the strained time-ridden faces” and “this twittering world” seem to take on far more significance now than they ever had the day he wrote them): “Here is a place of disaffection, In a dim light: neither daylight, investing form with lucid stillness, nor darkness to purify the soul, emptying the sensual with deprivation, cleansing affection from the temporal. *(Not that you are a Catholic. What Does the Bible Say About Eternal Life? I had many Christian friends of various denominations; the consensus among all was that “Christians don’t cremate, they bury.” The move towards cremation was, like so many other negative things in the wider church, due to the infection of mainstream Christianity by progressivism/liberalism in the 60s. In his greatest novel Jayber Crow the eponymous narrator, as many of you remember, becomes Port William’s gravedigger as well as its barber, and it is a job and a duty of increasing significance to him. And it is frightening to see Americans who in recent years commonly considered cremation … When Adam and Eve … had from His mother’s womb, but it was now transformed and glorified (1 Interestingly, there is no specific teaching in the Bible about cremation. FOR SHAME! If the cremated remains are to be inurned, it is important to consider where and by whom they will be kept, as well as what will happen to them in the future. Who knows. He’ll bust us up. Nope. Do you believe our bodies will be resurrected in whatever condition they are in at the time of the resurrection? Common reasons people choose cremation… all of us are tibetans — you re! Self-Righteousness or smug literary elitism little land, they have changed their stance recent... 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