Six Feet Under

Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
--Traditional

In our end is our beginning; in our time, infinity;
in our doubt there is believing; in our life, eternity.
In our death, a resurrection; at the last a victory,
unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see.
--Natalie Sleeth

Dear Friends,

After presiding at a grave side service a few weeks ago, the family of the 95 year old woman who had died did something I had not seen before.

They stayed by her grave until the casket had been lowered into the grave and the lid of the vault had been placed into position. It was not an easy task, taking the cemetery workers about 20 minutes and requiring special machinery to maneuver the 250+ pound metal casket into the vault and the 1,000+ pound vault cover into place.

Over the 13 years I’ve presided at graveside services I can’t remember another time when the family of the deceased person stayed to watch the casket lowered into the grave. In my experience, after the short graveside service, the family will linger a bit longer to shed more tears and share a few more stories before making their way back to their cars. It always struck me as odd to drive away from the cemetery with the casket still positioned above ground over the grave with artificial turf placed around it to mask the fact that it would be placed into a hole dug into the earth. I remember feeling guilty, like I had abandoned the deceased without ensuring that they actually made it to their final resting place.

The very first graveside I ever did was in Suffolk, England. After the funeral at the church, I rode in the funeral coach (aka the hearse) to a tiny village where there was a cemetery alongside a little Anglican church that was probably hundreds of years old. The simple wooden coffin was carried on pallbearers’ shoulders to the grave, a dark rectangular hole in the ground that smelled of damp, fresh earth. There was no artificial turf to mask the grave or hide the soil excavated. There was no concrete vault into which the coffin would be placed, no 1,000+ pound vault cover that needed to be positioned with special equipment. The pallbearers simply lowered the plain, wooden coffin into the grave using ordinary woven straps. 

And then, when I came to the line in the graveside service, “earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” without being told to, those around me each scooped up a handful of earth and solemnly cast it into the grave onto the coffin. And that was it. She was in her final resting place and eventually her body would be turned back into the dust from whence it had arisen.

When I die—which I expect to be many years from now, but who knows?—I hope my loved ones stay with my body until it is lowered into the ground or slipped into the crematory fire. 

If I am cremated, I don’t want my “cremains” (yes, that’s a real word) to sit in an urn on a mantel. Scatter my ashes in a wildly beautiful place, a serenely tranquil setting, or a place where I was bursting with the goodness and vitality of life. 

If I am buried, I don’t want to be sealed away from soil and water and worms in a vault or metal container. Place me in a wooden coffin in the same outfit I was wearing the day I entered the world and return me to the elements that gave rise to my flesh and bone in the first place. 

Please, no artificial turf or shallow platitudes. Cast earth into that deep, dusky grave as a sign of hope that we can indeed consign our loved ones to the earth (or fire) knowing that the story is not over, not even close, and that the love of God flowing through us in indestructible.

Peace be with you,

Jeremy

P.S. Burial or cremation? At one point in my life I thought I knew. Now I’m reconsidering.

The "Reverend"

For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb…My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes beheld my unformed substance…  (Psalm 139:13, 15, 16a)

God does not see as mortals see; they look on the outward appearance, but God looks on the heart… (1 Samuel 16:7)

The universe is not all about any one of us, but only all of us together and with God.  (Richard Rohr)

Dear Friends,

In my new appointment as the pastor of Tigard UnitedMethodist Church people have been asking me how I wish to be addressed. Reverend and Pastor seem to be the two options even though I have suggested “Most Venerable, Honorable, Esteemed and Very Right Reverend.” No takers on that one yet.

All kidding aside, I feel ambivalent about titles. I was given a name plate several years ago that included the word “Reverend” engraved beneath my name. Every time I looked at it struck me as pompous and self-important so to tone it down I wrote “IR” on a piece of paper and taped it in front of “REVEREND.” That felt much better. When asked the question about how I wish to be addressed, I usually say something like, “Just call me Jeremy.” It is my name, after all.

I know that honorific titles like Rev and Pastor and Dr and Mr and Ms have a role to play in how people relate to one another. I don’t want my children to call their teacher or doctor or the President by their first name. I want to teach them proper respect for authority figures. (I also want them to learn how to challenge unjust authority…but that’s for another time.) And for adults who use honorific titles, I also acknowledge that it is meant to show respect for the leadership role that one inhabits which is distinct from the person in that role. By virtue of my ordination in the United Methodist Church, I am a clergyperson—a “Reverend”—just like a person with a medical degree and license is a “Doctor.” So while I don’t shun a title, I don’t particularly feel a need to broadcast a title, either.

For me, it comes down to that basic question of identity. Who am I, really? Beneath any titles I might be justified in using, underneath the roles I inhabit—pastor, father, husband, leader—who am I? Much of the spiritual life is about acknowledging and stepping beyond the ego. It’s about recognizing that all of the information we think makes us who we are is, in fact, peripheral to our true identity as a creature who has come into being through the creative impulse of God. Ultimately our true identity is not about our work, title, education, career, nationality or any other similar descriptors. Our true identity is rooted in the divine imprint upon our soul. I have seen how a strong attachment to one’s title or position of authority can wreak havoc on one’s spiritual life. I don’t want to go there, hence my ambivalence around titles.

So call me what you will—Rev Jeremy, Pastor Jeremy, Hey You, Jeremy, or Mister. Just keep it nice. I’m praying all the time that I will remember that my true identity is beloved child of God. May you remember that, too!

Meditation: "Justice and Family Friction"

For Dallas UMC folks, this is a re-print of my article in the September 2013 newsletter.
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“Do you think that I have come to bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, I have come instead to bring division. From now on, a household of five will be divided—three against two and two against three. Father will square off against son and son against father; mother against daughter and daughter against mother; and mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law…” Luke 12:51-53 (CEB)

So much for so-called Christian family values.

These words of Jesus are confusing. He is, after all, the Prince of Peace, the one who calms storms, the holy child “meek and mild” born that silent night of long ago.

But they make sense to me when I think about a little piece of my own family’s past. The 50^th anniversary of the March on Washington (originally known as the “March for Jobs and Justice”) was August 28, 1963. My father, 22 years old at the time, was there. He’d graduated from college the spring before and was heading off to Yale Divinity School. Dad was deeply committed to civil rights (still is). And I know that his Christian convictions were one reason, maybe the reason, that he cared about civil rights. Unfortunately, my grandparents, his future in-laws, were not quite so enamored with Dr. King and the people in our country who were calling for an end to segregation and greater justice for minorities. To avoid telling private family stories, let’s just say that my father’s involvement in the civil rights movement—such as it was—caused a measure of friction within the family.

One common misunderstanding of Christianity is that it is a private religion that should only focus on individual salvation. But it’s very clear that Jesus wasn’t focused only on individuals. He came to usher in the “Kingdom of God” which was about building a community of people faithful to the love, grace, and justice of God. Dr. King called this “the Beloved community.” Sometimes a deep commitment to Jesus’ vision for the world causes tension, even conflict, with friends and family who cannot understand why someone’s commitment to Jesus might cause them to march or protest or get arrested.

One of the remarkable things about the March on Washington was how peaceful it was. There was an expectation of violence and chaos on the part of many who were suspicious of the motives of the organizers of the march. Afterwards, there was broad recognition—even among detractors—that the march had been peaceful and, therefore, powerful in promoting its message of economic justice and racial equality.

I have a deep respect for the Christians who—motivated by their commitment to the way of Jesus—put their lives on the line for justice and fairness in the world, even if it causes tension within their own family.

And I’m proud of my Dad, who marched on Washington 50 years ago for “jobs and justice” and heard with his own ears those famous words of Dr. King, “I have a dream…”

Grace and Peace,

Jeremy