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 Manchu wrote:

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
the word often suggests that it isn't a consistent practice, yes?

I only say "often" because the Church provides a huge amount of aid of all kinds to all ages of people, yes even including dead ones, but it's not like a government grant, like Medicaid or something, and I suspect it is handled differently in different places with special emphasis on the particular circumstances in question. If you aren't impressed with the amount of services the Catholic Church provides, it is probably because you are ignorant of them - which doesn't necessarily reflect poorly on you, these things are not really advertised like most do-gooding. But just assuming the opposite is pretty shameful.

Does the Catholic church provide free burials to all of its practitioners? If no, then requiring them to be buried and not cremated, despite the costs involved in burial, which many adherents can't afford, is pretty shameful. Your admonishment of people choosing cremation for economic reasons and sarcastically suggesting that they can just as easily sell their dead to pet food companies is also pretty gross, considering people often go into large debt in order cover unexpect funeral expenses.

I live in a Catholic heavy population and I see frequent collections on street corners and in convenience stores to help pay for burials. That gak ain't cheap, and for an institution as wealthy as the Catholic church to put that sort of financial burden on its followers is, well, let's use your word: shameful.

So let me just see if I understand the false dilemma: it's pay for all funeral costs or remain silent on the issue of funeral rituals?

Criticizing cynical considerations is fair game. Funerals are not really about disposing of the body, so to speak. If that is becoming the main concern then we are already, conceptually speaking, in a very dark place. Following the argument to its logical conclusion is perforce disturbing (that's the point).

 Manchu wrote:
So let me just see if I understand the false dilemma: it's pay for all funeral costs or remain silent on the issue of funeral rituals?

Why wouldn't the Church want to provide for its adherents? Especially given that the Church is decreeing that a particular (and costly) form of burial is required of those adherents?

If the Vatican isn't willing to facilitate that decree then, yes, I think they should remain silent on the issue. Otherwise they are placing unnecessary burden on their followers--many of whom are already burdened and desperate.

If the Church isn't willing to provide a free burial for every Catholic, why not? The Vatican has immense wealth, (often tax free) lands, and the means to enable their poorest and most disadvantaged followers a proper burial. Wouldn't that be what God would want? The Church taking care of its flock?

The church really shouldn't require people to attend mass, not without providing affordable housing, transportation, and a job that lets me attend all the required services.

Am I doing this right?

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
Why wouldn't the Church want to provide for its adherents?

As already discussed, it does want to and it does. It also provides for non-adherents. I think we can probably breeze past a lot of what I am sure is talking past each other pretty quickly by distinguishing between the Catholic Church and a state. But then again your argument that X must be funded by whoever requires X is not even applicable to the state.

 d-usa wrote:
Am I doing this right?

Yes, that's the argument.

 Manchu wrote:
But then again your argument that X must be funded by whoever requires X is not even applicable to the state.

Maybe not legally, but it sure seems to be a common argument. For example, remember how some of the opposition to Obamacare was based on "the government shouldn't be allowed to force me to buy insurance with my own money"?

Sure I recall but I think we can agree that whatever merit that argument might hypothetically have is a matter of the specific issue of health insurance and the federal government rather than as a general principle. I mean, I know there are people who object to the idea of state-mandated automobile insurance as a matter of principle but I don't consider their arguments applicable here, much less credible generally.

 Manchu wrote:
Sure I recall but I think we can agree that whatever merit that argument might hypothetically have is a matter of the specific issue of health insurance and the federal government rather than as a general principle. I mean, I know there are people who object to the idea of state-mandated automobile insurance as a matter of principle but I don't consider their arguments applicable here, much less credible generally.

No, I don't think that's true at all. I think the argument was just what it sounded like: an objection to the idea of a government mandate buy X with their own money. It just happens to be the case that insurance is one of the few (only?) things the government normally forces people to buy.

I don't think that actually responds to the point I made, which boils down to that the argument you cited is a poor one when made in general terms.

 Peregrine wrote:


Maybe not legally, but it sure seems to be a common argument. For example, remember how some of the opposition to Obamacare was based on "the government shouldn't be allowed to force me to buy insurance with my own money"?

That argument always confused me, at least when it regards something that could potentially concern your health. Here in the UK, everyone pays towards supporting the NHS, whether they go through its doors once in their lives or once a week, so that people who may suffer an unexpected injury or disease that they can't afford to get treated can still be treated.

It works well in that scenario, however I think even regarding collective communities, paying your share doesn't always make sense. Regarding paying for other's burials within a religion, I'd say that, despite funerals being an unexpected happening, they are a very personal event, and one that should be logically paid for by the family and possibly their friends. Perhaps it'd be a nice gesture for the forefront of that religious group to help pay for a funeral and burial, but I wouldn't say it's logically mandatory for the sake of common decency.

G.A

I'm not sure why I care what the Vatican "rules", but for some reason I find this deeply offensive. When my father died, he requested to have his ashes scattered in a place that he loved. I personally carried his ashes across land and sea to that place, and carried out his wishes, which was a profoundly important and meaningful moment for me. How dare the Vatican say there is something wrong with that. Where do they get off telling people how to live, who it is "okay" to marry, or how to die? I don't think I've ever been more disgusted with this belief system than I am right now.

You can disagree with something without being insulting and stepping over the rule 1 line. Keep that in mind, motyak

Are you Catholic?

a funny story:

A friend of mine was cremated, and used to cut some coke. (per his request)

At the snorting of said coke, one of the partakers sneezed, and then exclaimed in a startled voice 'gak, I blew Dick all over the place!"

It took some time for the laughter to stop. He'd have liked it.

 d-usa wrote:
Are you Catholic?

My father grew up in Ireland, so my family is very very Catholic. My aunty (his sister) still attends mass every Sunday, and lights a candle for him (when appropriate). I'm obviously non-religious, but I still find this hurtful.

 Smacks wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
Are you Catholic?

My father grew up in Ireland, so my family is very very Catholic. My aunty (his sister) still attends mass every Sunday, and lights a candle for him (when appropriate). I'm obviously non-religious, but I still find this hurtful.

Fair enough then.

I was mainly asking because I see this mostly as a "private members club" making rules that really only apply to the members of the club, and I know in this thread we already had a lot of people being very passionate about something that doesn't really apply to them at all.

Either you accept Catholic faith and tradition, including the magisterium, or you don't. If you don't then getting offended and upset is simply nonsensical. It's exactly like the whole thing about non-Catholics being offended about the fact that they shouldn't receive communion at mass. If you don't want to be in communion with the Catholic Church, i.e., if you don't want to be Catholic, then what on earth does it matter to you?

 Smacks wrote:
I don't think I've ever been more disgusted with this backwards bigoted belief system than I am right now.

This applies exactly to how your posts are coming off, to me at least.

My issue is that they are using Christianity as a front for their greed. Very little of what the Catholic Church does has anything to do with Christ.

 SlaveToDorkness wrote:
Very little of what the Catholic Church does has anything to do with Christ.

That's staggeringly ignorant.

Well, on one hand you're completely right, it doesn't matter to me, I don't even believe in it. On the other hand... it's a bit like if a gay person were confronted with a "god hates fags" banner (if I may make an analogy). You don't have to believe in god to find that offensive.

It insinuates that people who aren't laid to rest on "sacred" (I'm guessing church owned) land, are somehow "unholy" or otherwise not good enough.

 Smacks wrote:
(I'm guessing churched owned)

Bad guess.

If you take a look at what's going with your reaction to this I think you may find that you're projecting your own righteousness on someone else's religion. What is at stake here is a Catholic funeral ritual. The Catholic authority on such things, to greatly oversimplify matters for the sake of discussion, has concluded (I assure you, not arbitrarily) that certain contemporary customs, which are gaining in popularity, are incompatible with Catholic belief and practice. That's it.

As for your hypothetical banner ... I don't think it's at all the same thing. The slogan in that case is pretty clearly being presented specifically to intentionally offend.

So for practising Catholics, such as my aunty, what are they supposed to do if a loved one's ashes have already been scattered? The implication here is that the loved one won't get into heaven (which is kind of the objective of the religion). It's not like you can go and gather the ashes back up, and move them.

I don't know if the Vatican has ex-post-facto laws, but reading the actual paper it doesn't really look like it affects burial practices prior to this "ruling".

An actual Catholic might have a better answer to that though.

Edit: Additional question from me:

If someone is denied an ecclesiastical funeral, does that invalidate their salvation or other aspects of their Faith in Christ in the view of the Catholic Church?

 Smacks wrote:
The implication here is that the loved one won't get into heaven

Wrong again and another example of projecting. Lack of Christian funeral is not ipso facto a sentence to hell. Furthermore, the only persons denied Christian funeral according to this teaching are those who "notoriously" choose to have their ashes scattered "for reasons contrary to the Christian faith." So in other words, if you intend to use your death as a big midle finger to the Catholic faith, don't expect the Church to cooperate. Seems reasonable.

 Manchu wrote:
I don't think that actually responds to the point I made, which boils down to that the argument you cited is a poor one when made in general terms.

I didn't say it was a good argument, only that, contrary to your claim, it's an argument that people make about the state. Whether or not it's a good argument people do make the argument "if someone requires X they should pay for X" in other contexts. Outside of insurance or funerals there's the argument of "if you're going to require painted models in tournaments then you should pay for my models to be commission painted".

 d-usa wrote:
If someone is denied an ecclesiastical funeral, does that invalidate their salvation or other aspects of their Faith in Christ in the view of the Catholic Church?

No. But denial of Christian burial is pretty serious and generally a result of someone having acted intentionally in a way comtrary to Christian faith (as discussed above).

 Peregrine wrote:
contrary to your claim, it's an argument that people make about the state

I made no such claim.

 Manchu wrote:
Furthermore, the only persons denied Christian funeral according to this teaching are those who "notoriously" choose to have their ashes scattered "for reasons contrary to the Christian faith." So in other words, if you intend to use your death as a big midle finger to the Catholic faith, don't expect the Church to cooperate. Seems reasonable.

This seems like a rather significant clarification. So a person who chooses to have their ashes scattered because they can't afford a place in a cemetary or to be with their spouse who had their ashes scattered or whatever would still be given a Catholic funeral as long as they aren't doing it as some kind of anti-Catholic statement?

 Manchu wrote:
The Catholic authority on such things ... has concluded (I assure you, not arbitrarily)

I don't feel very assured that it isn't "arbitrary". Did Jesus himself come back and decree it? I must have missed that on the evening news. It sounds to me like the very fething definition of "arbitrary", in fact some might say "completely made-up BS"... some might say.

 Manchu wrote:

 Smacks wrote:
The implication here is that the loved one won't get into heaven

Wrong again and another example of projecting. Lack of Christian funeral is not ipso facto a sentence to hell.

Well then there is no reason not to scatter people wherever the hell you like, is there?

 Manchu wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
contrary to your claim, it's an argument that people make about the state

I made no such claim.

 Manchu wrote:
But then again your argument that X must be funded by whoever requires X is not even applicable to the state.

Whether or not you or I think it's a good argument it is one that people apply to the state.

 Manchu wrote:

 d-usa wrote:
If someone is denied an ecclesiastical funeral, does that invalidate their salvation or other aspects of their Faith in Christ in the view of the Catholic Church?

No.

So to potentially over-simply this:

When the Catholic Church finds that you cannot take communion for whatever reason, it doesn't automatically mean that you are stripped of your salvation and send to hell upon your death, it just means that you cannot take communion right now?

So is this kind-of a funeral version of this concept? It's less about the status of your salvation, it's more about "activity X comes with these rules, if we don't follow the rules we can't perform activity X for you" and not "if you don't do activity X your entire life was meaningless and you go to hell"?

 Peregrine wrote:
Whether or not you or I think it's a good argument it is one that people apply to the state.

i see the confusion; I meant, an accpeted reality about how the state works (because of course the reverse is true).