Truths of death and life at Halloween

I remember the first time I touched a corpse. It was at once eerie and sad. The cold, lifeless body still resembled in so many ways the person I knew, but now was irrevocably unresponsive. Limbs heavy. Color fading. Eyes half-open, half-gazing. Still.

Our purpose was to prepare him for burial. Embalming (which became common only after the Civil War) is not a part of the ancient Christian tradition. Rather, the body of the deceased is washed in a holy fashion, in peace, with the reading of the Psalms and other passages from the Bible. Fingernails are clipped. Hair washed and combed. Modesty and dignity are preserved by use of a folded white sheet used as a partial cover. Once clean, the corpse is anointed with fragrant myrrh, and then dressed in a white garment, reminiscent of the purity of one's baptismal robe. With final prayers, the body is put into a simple wooden coffin and taken to the church for the funeral service, followed by burial.

I also remember the first time I kissed a corpse. It was that same funeral. The ancient Christian tradition calls for an open casket at the service. The coffin is placed in the center of the church, feet facing the altar, so that if the dead man rose, he would face east, the direction from which the Lord is expected to return. At the end of many sober hymns that intermingle the sad reality of human death with the firm hope of eternal life found in the Christian Gospel, one last text is sung, "the Last Kiss." Each, in rank, draws near to the casket to pay his last respects to the deceased, generally kissing the (cold) forehead, and/or the folded hands. It is at once sad and extremely cathartic.

For Orthodox Christians, the above is "normal." We acknowledge, unhappily, that we will each face death. But we are also hopeful because of our faith. The intersection of the two is the treatment of the body as a holy relic -- some truly are. There is nothing to fear. It is sad, not scary. In a similar manner, Jesus' own body was treated and buried.

This all clashes quite brutally with our "culture of death" (as the late Pope John Paul II called it), which teaches us actively and also passively either to pretend that death is not coming (botox, cosmetic surgery, pursuits of eternal youth, etc.) or that it didn't happen (embalming, lighting, plus all sorts of post-mortem cosmetics).

It clashes nervously with our children. Numbers of people are reluctant to take their children to funerals and/or to let them see a dead person (grandmother, father, aunt, neighbor). But they are fully willing to subject their children to the wicked graveyards springing up in our neighborhoods even weeks before lucrative Halloween. (On my neighborhood bike rides, I have seen an increasingly grotesque collection of such graveyards. I thought to myself, "It won't be long before someone puts a coffin in the front yard." Then I saw one.)

Why the disconnect? Why the flight from reality on the one hand and the toying with it on the other? I wish I could attribute it to a "mockery" of death in some profound, symbolic way. But I don't think folks give it that much consideration. For some reason, many adults, perhaps reliving what they think would have been a "cool" childhood, spend time, money, and lots of energy in decorating their yards for a monthlong night that is increasingly disconnected (if it ever was connected) to its Christian heritage: All Hallows Eve, the night before All Saints Day. A day on which Christians in the Western tradition remember how Jesus has trampled down death by death, and how the resultant, beautiful, resplendent life is lived by those -- called Saints -- who by faith accept this reality and cooperate with God to become holy men and women.

One saintly desert monk in the fourth century said, "To see oneself as one truly is, is a miracle greater than raising the dead." That is, to know and accept, and deal with, reality as it really is: now that is a true miracle, and the one who does is a saint.

Each year, Halloween becomes more macabre in our neighborhood. I sometimes wonder how much more so it can become and remain only an imitation of death. Each year also, we humans are confronted with the grim reality of death in the persons of our family members, friends and neighbors. And one day, we shall face our own. We can run from it. We can pretend it is not around us. We can try to avoid it. We can mask it, cosmeticize it, and sanitize it, but we cannot escape it.

What would it look like if we forewent the time and the expense of making our lawns, porches and plantations into fright zones, and visited a real, dying person? How would our life -- and our own death -- be different? We don't need to look far. Hospices and hospitals are filled with such dear ones. Pray with him. Read to her. And once departed this life, to wash, anoint, and dress him for a beautiful and holy final rest. In so doing, we could contemplate how little time we have to prepare ourselves for our own sad sentence, and see it for what it truly is, making necessary changes in our daily existence, while time still permits. Then finally, in dying well, we might truly find life.

Fr. John Parker is pastor of Holy Ascension Orthodox Church in the I'On Community in Mount Pleasant. He can be reached at frjohn@oca charleston.org or 881-5010.