Summer 2004
Introduction

Why Funerals?

By Robert Kastenbaum, guest editor

We can learn about a society from the questions asked as well as the answers provided. "Funerals are for the living" is a preemptory answer that often presents itself even before a question can be raised. This fast-trigger answer to an unasked question protects us from uncomfortable reflections about our beliefs and assumptions. Crawling through a convenient escape hatch, however, can be inconsistent with our responsibilities as human-service providers. We try to cultivate perspective, a readiness for reflection, and the nerve to cross into difficult territory when the situation so requires.

Coming to the present case, we can be more helpful to people who are facing death-related issues if we are prepared to go beyond the formulaic answer to the question, Why funerals? Echoes from the past are resonating today within a high-tech society that has been trying hard not to listen. Beneath our whiz-bang, cybernetic, palm-pilot daily whirl we still have much in common with those who confronted death long before history found an enduring voice. Our orientation must somehow take into account both the distinctive characteristics of life in the early twenty-first century and our continuing bonds with all who have experienced the loss of loved ones. We begin, then, with a retrospective view and then look at funerals in our own time. For further background we suggest, among other sources, Handbook of Death and Dying (Bryant, 2003), Macmillan Encyclopedia of Death and Dying (Kastenbaum, 2002), On Our Way: The Final Passage Through Life and Death (Kastenbaum, 2004), At the Hour of Our Death (Aries, 1981), and The Sacred Remains: American Attitudes Toward Death (Laderman, 1996).

THE DEAD: VULNERABLE AND DANGEROUS

Early history speaks to us in the remote and fragmented language of bones, shards, tools, and burial mounds. The archaeological history of life on earth reaches farther back than written records. Bones are still being consulted by forensic investigators (Ubelaker and Scammell, 1992), and remains of eminent citizens of Verona are being exhumed and analyzed more than six hundred years after their owners drew their final breaths (Williams, 2004). Furthermore, ancient documents were often devoted to the perils faced in the journey of the dead. Rituals for guiding and communicating with the dead have been at the core of virtually all world cultures. It has been suggested that the spiritual health of a society can be evaluated by the vigor with which it continues to perform its obligations to the dead. Something crucial to the survival of a society is endangered when the living are unwilling or unable to continue customs and rituals intended to regulate relationships with the dead.

Through the millennia, our ancestors performed rituals both to affirm communal bonds among the living and to secure the goodwill of the resident deities. Ritual performances instructed members in their group responsibilities, celebrated life, encouraged fertility, and offered protection from malevolent forces. In this sense, funerary rites certainly were for the living-but that was only part of the story. Funerals were for the dead, too. An outsider with a sharp pencil and a notebook might insist on separating and classifying societal practices, including the "for the living," and "for the dead." The society itself, though, was more likely to regard all these beliefs and processes as integrated within its worldview. From the insider's perspective it was obvious that the living needed to do right by the dead. Failure to carry through with postmortem obligations could provoke the wrath of the deceased as well as the gods. Moreover, the discontented dead were not only dangerous-they were also vulnerable, needing the help of the living community. Everybody-living and dead-was in it together.

The living had two persuasive reasons for taking good care of their dead: love and fear. Although the details of mourning customs have varied widely, people everywhere have generally sorrowed at the loss of a person dear to them. We would recognize the anguish of newly bereaved people thousands of years ago and they would recognize ours:

• We would both want to feel that our loved one is "all right," even though dead.
• We would not feel ready to sever our ties completely. There seems to be a powerful need for what has become known in recent years as "continuing bonds" (Klass and Walter, 2001).
• And we would want-somehow-to continue to express our love and respect, and to keep something of that person with us.

Today, a widow might not choose to convert her husband's jawbone into a necklace or his skull into a lime-pot, but this worked for the Trobriand Islanders as they preserved and transformed anatomical artifacts to serve as generational hand-me-downs in memory of those who had come before (Barley, 1995). Perhaps the islanders would have made DVDs from the family album had this technology been available-or perhaps the "real thing" was to be preferred in any event. Whatever the particular practice, the living could not rest easy until the departed spirits were likewise settled into their spiritual or symbolic estate.

The vulnerability of the newly dead and their potential for malignant intervention is the side of this story that has been shooshed aside by technologically advanced societies. That the dead have something to fear and that we have something to fear from the dead might be dismissed as outmoded superstition. Nevertheless, by whatever name, fear for and of the dead continues to beset many people even if such fear is less recognized by mainstream society. It is still a powerful force within some ethnic traditions and also an impulse that can break through into the lives of mainstream people when they least expect it.

A CONTEMPORARY EXAMPLE:
'UNNATURAL DEATHS' OF THE YOUNG

The Tohono O'Odham of the American southwest are among the many traditional societies that became outcasts in their own land. A desperate economic situation added to their plight when local employment opportunities fell victim to technological and expansionist change. The most shattering consequence has been the increased frequency of "unnatural deaths" among young males. The official causes of death are (often alcohol-related) suicide, accidents, and homicide. These deaths are disturbing for both personal and cosmic reasons. Those who die before their time are mourned by family and community, who also fear for the future of their hard-pressed society with so many losses among the younger generation. There is another ominous facet to these deaths, however. The young men died before their spirits were prepared for the transition to the next life. This untimely occurrence upsets the natural order of things. It also constitutes a threat to the community because spirits of the deceased like to visit their living family members with a kind and loving attitude. Those who have died "unnaturally" are dangerous visitors.

Kozak (1991) found that

To counteract this danger, the living erect death-memorials so that the soul of a "bad" death victim will return to the location of their demise, rather than to their previous, worldly existence . . . But the death-memorial is also the location where family and friends of the deceased go to assist the soul to si' alig weco. This term means "beyond the eastern horizon," and it is where all O'odham souls reside after death. (pp. 212-13)

Here's the key point: The living can move ahead confidently with their lives only after they have succeeded in helping the newly dead to attain their own kind of peace "beyond the eastern horizon." Funerals and memorials clearly are for the living and the dead.

Horrible nightmares have afflicted people in many times and places when they have failed to assist the dead in their passage to the next life. It's the difference between a comforting visit from the spirit of a deceased loved one and the uneasy sense of being haunted. An example of epic proportions occurred during the prime killing years of the Black Death in fourteenth-century North Africa, Asia, and Europe. The dead sometimes outnumbered the living, who, frightened and struggling for their own survival, often had to forgo ritual and dump bodies into large burial pits or crowded shallow graves. Survivor stress included the fear that their own souls had been condemned for the failure to provide the proper rituals and services. It is even possible that the fourteenth century's intensified violence and episodes of mass psychotic behavior owed something to this violation of the implicit contract between the living and the dead (Kastenbaum, 2004).

GROUND ZERO

The abundant examples in our own time include the repeated television images of "first responders" to the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, as they worked desperately, first to rescue living victims and then to uncover human remains in Ground Zero rubble. Few would have difficulty in understanding the urgent (and, unfortunately, unrewarded) efforts at rescue. The great determination to recover the dead, however, was probably instructive to a public that had become accustomed to a more pragmatic and functionalistic approach. The assumption that "the dead are just dead" was forcefully contradicted. The victims were no longer alive, but they were not yet "safely dead," if the phrase be permitted. Both the victims and their families were in a kind of a limbo-actually, in a limbic zone between one identity and another. Rites-of-passage theory (Gennep, 1960) conceives of life as a sequence of many smaller journeys within the larger tour of the total course of existence. The theory often emphasizes the vulnerability of people who have moved from their previous secure status but have not yet reached their next destination or haven.

Both the September 11 victims and the stricken families were trapped in this nowhere zone, and there was no certain endpoint at which this painful situation would be resolved. Families who had lost a member in the September 11 disaster felt they could not really start to go on with their lives until the dead had been "brought home" in some meaningful sense of the term. Funeral and memorial services eventually were held without the bodies when it became clear that the remains would never be recovered and identified. In these and many other instances, the living have expressed their need to do all that should and could be done for the dead. For the living really to get back to life (as best they could) required that the dead also be given the opportunity to move securely to their destination on time's relentless caravan. Such circumstances illustrate how simplistic it would be to insist that funerals were either just for the living or the dead.

THE INCONVENIENT DEAD IN A CLOUD OF CONFUSION

In our times, the "why funerals?" question is sometimes prompted by a feeling that the dead have become an inconvenience. Funerals are merely vestigial rites that drain our precious time, money, and energy. Funerals are usually depressing affairs anyway, not that much help even to the living. We can hardly wait until they are over and then the dead are still dead, so what's been accomplished?

This view does not yet seem to be dominant in North American society but has become increasingly evident since our transformation from an agrarian nation in which most people stayed pretty much in place and the church was a cornerstone of communal life. "Deathways" have moved slowly and reluctantly along with the times as we have become a technologically enhanced land where change of address, job, and partner have become normative. Furthermore, along with other developed nations, we have achieved a significantly longer average life expectancy. Funerals less often become a gathering for sorrowing parents as their young children are laid to rest; more often the mourners are adult children who are paying their respects to a long-lived parent.

There are also signs of generational differences in the importance attached to funerals and memorial services. People still make sentimental journeys to visit family burial places. With disconcerting frequency, however, the remembered neighborhoods of their childhood have been altered beyond recognition or acceptance. Many burial places, whether in churchyards, woodland fields, or town cemeteries, have deteriorated for lack of upkeep, or have even been obliterated by the forces of change. It is understandable that some family members would rather keep their memories than face such sad prospects. The dazzling phenomenon of Americans in motion has dispersed many families who "in the old days" would have been regularly popping into each other's kitchens on a regular basis. Many families do remain emotionally connected and take advantage of up-to-date communication technology. Nevertheless, it is often a physical and financial strain to travel to bedside and funeral. Studies have suggested that older adults tend to find more comfort and meaning in funerals, but it is an open question whether "the new aged" of each generation will continue to find as much value. Even years ago I would often hear from elders that it would be a shame to waste money on "funeral stuff." One of the unforgettable comments came from the resident of a geriatric hospital:

You come here and everybody thinks you're already dead. Tell the truth: I knew I was near dead before. Every time you walk in a store and wait and nobody sees you . . . Just being old is just almost like being dead. Then, here. Then, dead. Who's going to care? Make a fuss? Not them. Not me.

We can hardly be surprised if people socialized within a gerophobic society should themselves internalize negative attitudes and decide that their deaths as well as their lives are undeserving of attention. Others, though, rally against the ageism and try to secure a dignified and appropriate funeral for themselves. The depressive surrender and the anxious seeking are differential responses to the same underlying concern: that a long life will receive an exit stamp of "Invalid: Discard. Shelf life expired."

WHY FUNERALS TODAY?

Funerals traditionally have provided both an endpoint and a starting point. The passage from life to death is certified as complete, so the survivors now can turn to their recovery and renewal. The effectiveness of funerals to achieve this bridging purpose can be compromised, however, by some characteristics of our times. For example, many folkways involved intensive family participation in preparing the body and the funeral arrangements (isolated examples still exist, e.g. Bryer, 1977; Crissman, 1994). In general, though, the preparation phase has passed to the funeral industry with the result that family mourners less often have the complete sense of release because of their limited involvement before the funeral. Furthermore, rapid socio-technological change has reduced intergenerational consensus on the value of the funeral process. One cannot assume that multiple-generation families will share priorities and expectations.

Another challenge to the social and spiritual value of funerals has been intensifying in recent years. Garces-Foley (2002-2003) reports an increase in the frequency of "funerals of the unaffiliated." More than a third of the U.S. population do not claim membership in a religious congregation. Religious officials confirm that they are being called upon more often to participate in such funerals in which families request that the religious service be "toned down."

I have noticed a parallel trend that might be called "funerals of the disengaged." People who have outlived-or, over time, drifted away from-their personal support systems are more likely to receive only perfunctory services. Those who would have felt a strong emotional link or at least a powerful sense of obligation have already passed from that person's life. People who have lived essentially solitary lives or become institutional residents have a high probability of exiting this life through the backdoor with minimal attention. Such an exit was a frequent occurrence within institutional settings where many residents seemed to have been forgotten or disregarded by the larger community and the facility itself was locked into a death-avoidance pattern. A funeral process that does not celebrate the life, mourn the passing, or provide symbolic safe passage through the journey of the dead-what else can we expect when the individual has been progressively disvalued through the years?

It is understandable that funerals might be disvalued if they seem to have lost their inner connection to the values and meanings that guide our lives. It is that inner connection that makes a difference between empty ritual and participation in an event that is both universal and deeply personal. To ask "Why funerals?" may sound like a rejection of the whole process. Most often, though, the question expresses a search for renewal of the inner connection between how we live and how we die.

That search is now taking a variety of forms. People who are uncomfortable with the familiar words, symbols, and gestures of mainstream religion are nevertheless finding ways to incorporate spiritual considerations into the funeral process. The "postmodern funeral" (Garces-Foley and Holcomb, in press) may include such elements as a candle-lighting ceremony and improvised memorials, music, and eulogies that are somehow special to the particular people involved. New partnerships are developing between those funeral directors who are open to change and those families who are determined that the funeral process represent their own way of life.

Two very different pathways are among those being explored. Some people are exploring the potentials of virtual funerals and memorials on the Internet-often as a supplement to a more conventional service. Others are turning to "green funerals." These are burials in woodland areas that are intended to return the body to earth in a natural form. There is no embalming to leak chemicals into the ground, and simple, biodegradable materials are used, e.g., willow coffins (Holmes, n.d.; Ross-Bain, n.d.). Funerals are to be removed from the technological-commercial matrix and put in the service of "producing wildlife habitats and forests from green burial sites, where native trees, wild flowers and protected animals are encouraged . . . meadow brown butterfly colonies, grasshoppers, insects, bats, voles and owls to multiply . . . where the mechanical mower does not prey on a regular basis and a self-supporting ecosystem can evolve" (Holmes, n.d.).

The funeral process today is caught up within the broader matrix of social change. Some of the negatives have already been identified. To these must be added that narrow construction of human life that embraces youth and material success but recoils from the specter of loss and limits. Where this attitudinal climate prevails, it is tempting to reject funerals because we are exposed there to the uncomfortable reminders of aging and death. Nevertheless, it remains as true today as ever that "taking good care of the dead" is a vital part of a society's support for the living. Clea Koff (2004), "The Bone Woman," has demonstrated this fact again as she contributed to the healing process in Rwanda by honoring the remains of the massacre victims.

Yes, funerals can take the form of dysfunctional vestiges if we let them go that way. Another choice is available to us, though. We can recognize that the funeral process offers an opportunity to reach deep into our understanding and values. Perhaps our society today does not offer the clearest and firmest guide to comprehension of life and death. Perhaps it is up to us, then, to review our own beliefs about the meanings of growth and loss, youth and age, life and death-and to listen carefully to the beliefs of those to whom we offer service.

Robert Kastenbaum, Ph.D., is professor emeritus, School of Human Communication, Arizona State University, Tempe.

REFERENCES

Aries, P. 1981. At the Hour of Our Death. New York: Knopf.

Barley, N. 1995. Dancing on the Grave. London: John Murray.

Bryant, C. D., ed. 2003. Handbook of Death and Dying. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage.

Bryer, K. B. 1977. "The Amish Way of Death." American Psychologist, 12:167-74.

Crissman, J. K. 1994. Death and Dying in Central Appalachia: Changing Attitudes and Practices. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.

Garces-Foley, K. 2002-2003. "Funerals of the Unaffiliated." Omega, Journal of Death and Dying 46: 287-303.

Garces-Foley, K., and Holcomb, J. S. In press. "Contemporary Funerals: Personalizing Tradition." In K. Garces-Foley, ed. Death and Religion in a Changing World. New York: M. E. Sharpe.

Gennep, A. van. 1960 (original 1909). The Rites of Passage. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Holmes, A. "Willow Coffins." www.druidnetwork.org/qwrites/passing.

Kastenbaum, R., ed. 2002. Macmillan Encyclopedia of Death and Dying. New York: Macmillan Reference USA.

Kastenbaum, R. 2004. On Our Way. The Final Passage Through Life and Death. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Klass, D., and Walter, T. 2001. "Processes of Grieving: How Bonds Are Continued." In M. S. Stroebe et al., eds., Handbook of Bereavement Research: Consequence, Coping, and Care. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association.

Koff, C. 2004. The Bone Woman. New York: Random House.

Kozak, D. 1991. "Dying Badly: Violent Death and Religious Change Among the Tohono O'Odham." Omega, Journal of Death and Dying 23: 207-16.

Laderman, G. 1996. The Sacred Remains. American Attitudes Toward Death, 1799-1883. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press.

Ross-Bain, I. "Perception of a Green Funeral." www.globalideasbank.org.

Ubelaker, D., and Scammell, H. 1992. Bones. A Forensic Detective's Casebook. New York: M. Evans.

Williams, D. 2004. "Exhumations of Long-Dead Nobles Stir Public." Washingtonpost.com, Feb. 20.

From Generations Summer 2004 issue, 28(2): 5-10. © 2004 American Society on Aging

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