Death and Memory
If indeed non-believers do seemingly ignore the emotional side at their peril (which is preposterous), believe you me that emotional side comes screaming back when you loose someone you dearly love. I think it`s especially wrenching when you consider you will never ever see that person again. You can develop very close ties within a family and even though you arrange your mental furniture to accept life`s inevitabilities, that essentially flies out the window whenthat loved one….umm…..joins your ancestors. No two ways about it, it sucks! The upside is that you can still carry on the family legacy of decency to your fellow human beings and that`s cool. I try to live the remainder of my life AS IF my loved one was looking down on me even though intellectually I`m pretty certain that`s not true.
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This is another one of those problems of cultural linguistics. We don’t have the words of mourning that don’t involve supernatural aspects. I think a great service would be done to change the language of mourning away from the supernatural and bring in aspects of remembrance and responsibility.
The concept of someone being gone is to harsh and raw for people to take and ultimately it isn’t true. I’ve lost many people over the last several years and in each case none of them is gone they continue in my memory. I know who they were, what was important to to them, what they taught me, their quirks and even their failures. Those things don’t go away so long as I remember those things. As a mourner it is our job to remember those and share that memory with others. So even in death a person can continue to grow and teach. So in a way they do live on but not as an independent entity. More concentration on thinking about the deceased and less effort talking about how they are in a better place can only help us come to terms with life without them.
Truly coming to terms with loss is not really helped by talk of heaven, but is greatly aided by connection to the circle of people who also feel loss. The Friends and relatives of the deceases who hold the other parts of him, and the release felt by sharing. That is the truly human and honest response to lost.
–Nephlm