What Do “F-U-N Funerals” and “Death Cafes” Teach Us about Mourning?
Jesus tells us, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” but we’re not so sure. Instead we’ve embraced a counterfeit beatitude: Blessed are those who numb out, for they will be comfortable.
Us westerners don’t do sad well. Maybe that’s why these days, more and more people are wanting “happy funerals.” American author, Erika Dilman, attempts to put the “F-U-N back in Funeral” in her book The Party of Your Life. She helps readers plan their guest list, create a cocktail menu, design a funeral soundtrack, and prepare goody bags. Some feel these celebrations bring a catharsis to their grief and allow attendees to laugh and focus on the positive memories and legacy that their loved one left behind.
Meanwhile, others are attempting to provide outlets for us to express our melancholy feelings. In 2017, a woman named Sue in London felt people didn’t know how to talk about their grief and started something called The Death Cafe. This was meant to be a safe space for people to gather, talk about death and find community with a side of cake. These Death Cafes have struck a chord and have quickly spread across Europe, North America, and into 66 countries. Linda Stuart, grief educator, says: “You may want a party. But you may need a funeral.”
Today, in countries like China and India, where it can be socially unacceptable to weep in public (for men in particular), some go so far as to hire professional mourners. There is a rich history of these paid actors known as moirologists, bringing theatrical demonstrations of chest-beating, loud-crying and tearing of their clothes and hair. Recently, they’re more likely to be paid to cry quietly, as cultural norms are shifting.
Whether we know it or not, all of us have our own grief procedures. While grief is the internal experience of loss, mourning is its outward expression. Grief is what we feel and think; mourning is what we do. It includes the public rituals (funeral and burial procedures) and behaviors (wearing black) that declare this is not the way things were supposed to be. Mourning is our response to grief; it’s how we show that we’re shocked, angry, and sad. The problem is, in the twenty-first-century West, we’re often not very good at it.
Opening up our Bibles—particularly in the Old Testament— we discover a formal approach to mourning that facilitates the expression of one’s sorrow. Though these Jewish customs might initially strike us as strange, God’s people engaged in patterns of mourning which allowed for personal and corporate lament in beautifully structured ways. For example, when a loved one died, life went on hold, and time was set aside for mourning. This began with the initial days of intense bereavement which came to be called “sitting shiva.” Shiva is the Hebrew word for seven, and refers to the seven days following the burial which were designated for weeping (Gen. 23:2) and lamentation (2 Sam. 1:17). This was followed by further time for expressions of grief, lasting thirty days out from the burial. Setting aside time to mourn was one way to give permission to the bereaved that it was okay to not be okay.
In ancient Near Eastern culture, mourning was dramatic. Today, if we’re looking for healthy ways to express what’s inside, our friends may suggest activities such as journaling or painting. While these are incredibly helpful exercises, they’re also very . . . quiet. Prophets like Ezekiel and Joel however, emphasized weeping, wailing, and groaning in anguish (Ezek. 27:31; Joel 1:5) because grief is sometimes loud.
Sometimes when we’re torn apart on the inside, we want to show it on the outside. Tearing one’s robe was an outward way to express the internal rupture that was happening, to say: I’m destroyed. I’m undone. Job was so beside himself when he got the news that a desert storm had stolen the lives of his kids that he shaved his head (Job 1:20). Mordecai and Esther wouldn’t eat when they heard of Haman’s plans to destroy God’s people (Esther 4:3,16). The Ninevites were so remorseful over their sins, they all put on a coarse, goat-hair garment called sackcloth (along with all their animals!) in the hope that God would have mercy on them (Jonah 3:8–9). After being sexually abused and assaulted by her half-brother, Tamar covered her head in ashes (2 Sam. 13:19). These simple rituals served as their picket signs toward sin and death.
For ancient Israelites, practices such as tearing clothes, weeping, wailing, and wearing sackcloth and ashes were built into their culture of grief. For us moderns, we will mourn in our own unique ways according to our beliefs, cultures, and temperaments. Nonetheless, those of us who consider ourselves private, internal processors or are bent toward a silver lining might do well in asking: What can we learn from our Jewish ancestors and the structured, expressive nature of their mourning? How can I bring what’s on the inside to the outside?
Or if we’re resistant to this, maybe it’s because truthfully we’ve believed a counterfeit beatitude: Blessed are those who numb out, for they will be comfortable.
Jesus invites us into a different way of living.
All around us, neighbors are suffering from alcoholism, self-doubt, and chronic illnesses. The man across the street might be dealing with crippling anxiety, insomnia, and lack of purpose.
The mother a few doors up may be crying herself to sleep each night desperately worried about how to make ends meet, and the children who walk past every morning dreading the bully at school. Do we wince? Do we cry out to God? Do we mourn? Does their pain impact us, too?
What if, in some sort of upside-down manner, there’s a flourishing that awaits when we mourn the brokenness that surrounds us? What if we didn’t go numb and “grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope” (1 Thes. 4:13) but experienced the soothing power of God’s presence in the thick of our pain and fears? What if a comfort awaits us that would change our neighborhoods?
If we were to embrace Jesus’ invitation into mourning, I can tell you this: looking out our own windows, we’d be more aware that we’re surrounded by image-bearers who feel exhausted, invisible, and heartsick. We’d be slower to judge and assume the worst, and quicker to pray these words with Paul:
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God (2 Cor. 1:3–4).
This is how our neighbors will know the God of all comfort, the One who is not far from them, who wants to use the bad for their good and give them eternal rest: when the comfort God has shown us on the inside shows up on the outside . . . when the comforted become the comforters, when the soothed become the soothers. When we say to our neighbors: “I’ve been there, I am with you. Here is the love Jesus has shown me—he is the true binder of broken hearts.”
A portion of this content taken from Neighborhoods Reimagined: How the Beatitudes Inspire Our Call to Be Good Neighbors by Chris and Elizabeth McKinney, ©2024. Used by permission of 10Publishing, a division of 10ofThose, England, www.10ofThose.com.