HW 48 - Family Perspectives on the Care of the Dead(This One!!)

I interviewed three adults: My mom, my dad and a friend. They all had various answers to the questions. My dad admitted that he thought there is no after life and how he was raised Catholic. "Being raised Catholic I developed a strong cynicism for it. The more and more it was pushed on me the more I felt it was a joke. All christians are supposed to 'turn the other cheek' yet the christians in charge of the government are wageing war! Also the concept of confession bothered me. I did not like how people were not accountable for their actions." It seems that his despise of catholicism did not enforce his beliefs of the afterlife but guided his views. This demonstrated an opposition to the way one of the piers I interviewed. She has been raised with christian values yet she has less resentment towards the way the bible deals with death. This could be because she is a young teenager and has not yet developed despise. It could also be because she has not had the same bad experiences with the christian religion.

         Both my mother and my father had attended the same funeral. It was a russian orthodox funeral about 16 years ago. The dead was my dads longtime best friend. My dad said that he did not get to enjoy it. He was devastated. He spent the whole time in a mourning, sad mood. My mother was also morning but was able to observe the cultural difference of the funeral. She said that she liked the beauty of the ceremony. Even though she did not understand a word of russian she found an "ancient charm" in the practices she observed. Comparing the ritual she described to a funeral I attended in california, I realized that the traditions were not preserved as much as it sounds the orthodox religion was. I can only assume that the funeral I witnessed was typical of american funerals.

        When I interviewed my friend he just seemed completely uncomfortable with the topic of care of the dead. He minimally answered all questions except, "have you ever been to a funeral"? Which he answered with, "Yes. A girl my senior year of high school died. I found it so strange how we all pretended to know her well and went to her funeral and mourned." This raises the question of, why does everyone respect people more when they die? Through analyzing his answer I came up with a few ideas on why. First off, It could be our cultures way of trying to get the dead spirit to not haunt us. It could also be trying to avoid offending the people who may have loved the dead. This idea is also proven by the death of Michel Jackson. He was commonly made fun of. All of a sudden when he dies the world is filled with, R.I.P Michel the king of music and my hero.