Why don't religious people cheer death?

Question

Obviously, they dont fear it, as it's the start of the great prize, bur shouldn't they be happy at funerals?

Answer 1

They don't cheer death because a sense of deprivation kicks in. The sadness and mourning is for themselves because of the sense of loss. It is a mental state. The thought that they will no longer have that person to talk to, to sit with, etc.

Here is an interesting story about mourning -

Two young men went off traveling. One of them died but the other having started a job decided to wait a while before returning home. He sent word to his home town about himself and his dead friend through another acquaintance. The acquaintance relayed the news but since he knew the two men only vaguely he inadvertently changed the names of the living and the dead man. This had a strange result. The dead man’s friends and relatives rejoiced that he was doing well and the living man’s friends and relatives were in grief that he was dead.

Answer 2

Today's society, at least as I see it, teaches people to fear death. It isn't a matter of being "religious" or "spiritual," it's a matter of being a part of a technologically advanced world society/culture which has gotten so full of its "living the big party life" that it cannot digest anything above and beyond it...and what you cannot understand, what you cannot "digest," you learn to fear...and society at large is overwrought with this fear.

Many religions the world over state that death is only a transition. That it is merely the crossed gateway into the next life or the life beyond...

Do your research...you will see that there are many belief systems which do celebrate the death of a master/teacher or such being instead of the birth. The death is seen as the ascension and the next step in the journey to the enlightened or Christed state.

My question to you: Do you fear death, or do you welcome the challenge of working towards the goal of attaining the next birth, and coming closer to ending the cycle?

Answer 3

In a way, some of them do. Some religious have Day of the Dead. I don't think anyone can really be happy at funerals though.

Answer 4

Went to the funeral of an elderly friend who escaped fairly quickly. All I could feel was jealousy. Lucky b-----d got away from here relatively quickly and did not have to wait for months or years in a nursing home where nobody really cares about you.

Answer 5

Selfish, aren't we? We want to keep our loved ones beside us. We mourn when they pass from us. But I have been to the funeral of a godly woman, and though we cried, we smiled through our tears as we were leaving the cemetery, remembering all she had given us, and confident that she was with her creator and savior. So you see, what you say is true. When a Christian dies, we can rejoice for them, even as the part of us that is human and selfish cries.

Answer 6

actually this is not offensive
The Dukhoubours of Russia when one of them died, they simply tossed to body to one side, since the spirit has gone above. they realised this. And again, in Ireland they used to take the body to the pub and prop it up at the bar.. a wake is a celebration. But love doesn't want anyone to die so it's a mystery, not something to wish for. Life is precious

Answer 7

I'm sure at the very least, religious people might be "comforted" by knowing their loved ones are in the afterlife with their maker, but not rejoicing. People find it hard to "be happy for" someone who died; they are more focused on their own personal loss of what that person meant to them. The shocking sense of loss is more dominant.

Answer 8

I've always wondered myself. In fact, I'd go even farther and ask: In religions that believe life here on earth is terrible and the afterlife is going to be so great, why aren't there more suicides?

Answer 9

I think we SHOULD cheer death, since that persons suffering with all these religious wackos is over, and we should also morn births for the exact opposite reason.

Oh to have a world without religion!

Answer 10

I think that if you are at a funeral, and the deceased was saved, and the surviving family is, there isn't as much crying. But we will miss them, because we are human. Even Jesus wept.