The Laughing Wolf

Honoring The Dead

My recent trip “home” to take care of the cemeteries brought to mind a debate I’ve been having with myself for a while now. To be honest, I am not sure there is any good or right answer to the debate. Yet, there are a number of things that deserve some thought and consideration as we enter the season.

Decorating the houses of the dead is an ancient practice that predates any current organized (or disorganized if you are an Episcopalian) religion. Many religions have a special day to clean and decorate, such as the Day of the Dead. The practice of putting evergreens and such on graves at this time of year has a long tradition going back to many “pagan” beliefs. It was a way of affirming life, and of honoring the dead.

In agrarian cultures, honoring the dead took on additional meaning because the dead were with them all the time. Tombs and cemeteries became more elaborate, and populations stayed in the same place. Even in frontier societies, this continued with the family plots on the family farm or claim. The dead were with us, and it was easy to show them honor at different times during the year.

We are no longer an agrarian society, and chunks – perhaps even significant chunks – of our population move around and away. The tombs of our loved ones are no longer easily available, and for those like me who were raised in the tradition of honoring the dead, it can pose a conundrum. How do we continue the tradition when we are no longer close by?

To begin to answer that, let’s look at some of the why tombs and such are decorated. In ancient times, the location of the body was felt in many cases to be an anchor point for the dead. It was where their spirit manifested, and that spirit was an entity to be feared as well as revered. The Romans were but one of many cultures and religions who prayed to their ancestors and felt that the spirits of the dead could bring good things or bad to the living. In this regard, it was a duty to the living as well as the dead to honor them as fully as possible.

Even when changing beliefs pushed this down a bit, the surface belief of showing respect to the dead requires easy access. The loss of that access was and is hard on some people, and history tells of those who failed to go to new lands and new opportunities so that family lands and family graves might be maintained.

Today, we have an added wrinkle in the mix of why we do things. In a time where people compete in decorating their homes for various holidays, there is a growing trend of carrying this to the houses of the dead.

So, if you decorate at the tombs of your dead, why do you do it? Is it to placate the spirits of the dead and entreat their blessings upon you? Do you do so as part of a competition, to show up your neighbors or other family members? Do you do it so that people, in particular family, will remember all those gone so that they live in that sense? Do you do it to truly honor them, or is it something you do for yourself either as penance or as an obligation? Do you do it because you believe deep down that they are there in that location?

Think on this a bit, and I may post more on my own internal debate later. The one thing I will suggest for today is that you show honor in other ways as well. Remember those gone with laughter and love. Think of the things they did at this time of year, remember the memories bright that can warm a heart as well as a room. Give that gift of memories to new generations, for that is a present that can be shared with all for generations to come.

LW