"Those who sow in tears shall reap with joyful shouting. He who goes to and fro weeping, carrying his bag of seed, Shall indeed come again with a shout of joy, bringing his sheaves with him." - Psalm 126 v5&6
"You have turned for me my mourning into dancing; You have loosed my sackcloth and girded me with gladness." - Psalm 30:11
"But we do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep, so that you will not grieve as do the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus." - 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14
My grandmother came down with a case of pneumonia, and i went to visit her in the hospital. They kept her in the ICU for days, trying to revive her. Yet, for all their efforts, she worsened daily. Eventually they put some kind of helmet over her head to help her breathe. Trying to speak to her through that contraption was like trying to speak to someone in another realm. Still, that afternoon, i heard her say clearly, “I love you, honey. Have fun at lunch.” When my parents and i came back after eating, she’d passed on. My mother and i sat beside the bed. My mother wept bitterly. i was silent and still; i’d had my fill of tears, standing at the foot of my dear grandmother’s bed as she slept that morning. It was strange, and unfair, to sit beside what was left of my grandmother and not the person herself. All that was left was a grey corpse and a bag of piss hanging off of the bed. But where was the person? Where?
Biology does not tell me where my grandmother went when she died. Only metaphysics can handle so great a question. But biology does tell me something interesting. It tells me that something was there before, and now has gone. This absence is measurable and has been clinically studied in the laboratory.
When a human being dies, their body instantly loses 3/4 of an ounce in weight (about 20 grams). This discovery was made by Dr. Duncan Macdougall in 1901(1) and has since been repeated. Other scientists have repeated the experiment on animals such as mice and dogs and have found that no body weight is lost at the moment of death(2). So far the phenomenon is only observed in human beings.......
We had the memorial today. It struck me as interesting that everyone was smiling and laughing for the entire day. Someone on the outside might have thought it irreverent, all the joy and merrymaking. They may have thought it seemed more like a birthday than a funeral. But it was, wasn’t it? Perhaps every funeral should feel like a birthday. Because death is not the end. Those 3/4 ounces have gone somewhere. Where you believe that somewhere is will determine your outlook on a funeral… and i can say that ours today was full of love, faith, joy, laughter, sunshine, hugs, and hope. We do not use blind hope as a crutch, but we have a true hope because of a true promise.
St. Godric said: "What's lost is nothing to what's found, and all the death that ever was, set next to life, would scarcely fill a cup."
Out of death God has brought new life. Out of sorrow He has created joy. And from a dark horizon, a new dawn rises. As for me, i hope there is dancing at my funeral, and the laughter of children, and a sense of hope for things to come...
(1) http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9D07E5DC123EE033A25752C1A9659C946697D6CF
(2) http://www.historicmysteries.com/the-21-gram-soul-theory/
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