Continuing the theme from last week of sharing previously written work (published and unpublished), below is the opening segment to a short blog post published last month on Mere Orthodoxy. In it, I reflect on the significance of state funerals to understanding our relationship to one another within a body politic.
Finding Wisdom in the House of Mourning
There is deep significance in how a society treats its dead. If history is to be considered, state funerals have played a significant role in public life. Western history and thought has found some of its most profound rhetoric in memorializing the dead. From Thucydides’ recounting of Pericles’ funeral oration, to Ronald Reagan’s eulogy for the Challenger astronauts, extracting meaning from the death of individuals in service to the state plays an essential role in reminding the body politic of its telos – its character and the good it seeks to pursue.
In the American context, what happens in a state funeral is unique, profound, and deserving of our participation. For a moment, public and private spheres overlap; church and state reach across the wall of separation; and the individual mourns with the nation in the most fundamental affirmation of human equality: we all die, and we all desire to be comforted when alive and remembered when dead.
For the Christian citizen, this may raise a troubling tension akin to being asked to burn incense to Caesar. Why give rosy-lensed praise to those who represent the far from perfect institutions of government? However, in the space provided by state funerals, the Christian citizen has a unique window in which the compassion of Christ may be displayed as we mourn with those who mourn. But, we cannot do so without entering as fully as we may into the City of Man and the care of its dead. How might we do that?
Read the rest of this essay on Mere Orthodoxy