Is Cremation Christian?

[iLOVE]

16 For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. 1 Thessalonians 4:16 NIV

Cremation Christians will rise with buried Christians the same time. Also see Ezekiel 37 - The Valley of Dry Bones.

 

[TOG]

I guess you forgot what you said as your reason for being against cremation:

...Christians believe that the body will be raised up when Christ returns to set up his kingdom...

I don't see anything about a pile of ashes there. In fact, I specifically said:

God is fully able to recreate whatever bodies have been destroyed, whether by fire or other means.

Where you get the idea that I believe people will be in Heaven as piles of ashes is beyond me, but please stop putting such ridiculous words in my mouth. If you are going to disagree with me, at least disagree with something I actually said.

The TOG​

 

[Obadiah]

I don't see anything about a pile of ashes there. In fact, I specifically said:



Where you get the idea that I believe people will be in Heaven as piles of ashes is beyond me, but please stop putting such ridiculous words in my mouth. If you are going to disagree with me, at least disagree with something I actually said.

The TOG​

Whatever, you said it, not me. That's why I said I don't understand you. Instead of being so confrontational why don't you just explain what you meant?

Edit: On second thought, never mind. I think you're just looking for a fight.

 

[TOG]

Whatever, you said it, not me. That's why I said I don't understand you. Instead of being so confrontational why don't you just explain what you meant.

Edit: On second thought, never mind. I think you're just looking for a fight.

Confrontational? Looking for a fight? I'm not the one making stuff up here. Nothing I sad can in any way be twisted to mean what you are saying. There's nothing to explain really. It's all there in plain English. If there's any part of it you genuinely don't understand, point out that part and I'll try to explain it, but don't just make stuff up.

The TOG​

 

[AirDancer]

My will states, and my offspring know, that I am to be cremated upon my death . And my offspring know precisely what they are to do with the ashes. They are all in agreement to honor my wishes in this matter. Our physical bodies are not required after we have finished with them here on Earth.

 

[Obadiah]

Confrontational? Looking for a fight? I'm not the one making stuff up here. Nothing I sad can in any way be twisted to mean what you are saying. There's nothing to explain really. It's all there in plain English. If there's any part of it you genuinely don't understand, point out that part and I'll try to explain it, but don't just make stuff up.

The TOG​

If you want, just go back and read my original post where I originally quoted you and said I didn't understand what you were getting at. Read the whole thing, don't just take one line out of context. But no need to answer my question anymore, I'm no longer interested. Don't worry about it. Let's just all be happy.

 

[TOG]

If you want, just go back and read my original post where I originally quoted you and said I didn't understand what you were getting at. Read the whole thing, don't just take one line out of context. But no need to answer my question anymore, I'm no longer interested. Don't worry about it. Let's just all be happy.

I've already replied to it, but you insisted on continuing to misrepresent what I said. But If you're willing to let it go, so am I. Just please stop putting words in my mouth.

The TOG​

 

[Obadiah]

I just read your post to my husband, I knew he'd chuckle.

He said to tell you what he had told me about his burial. So...this is the serious conversation right?

Pack (that means by horseback) me up on the mountain and kick me under a log.
The bears will eat you.
Na, my grandpa told me there were no turd eating bears in the forest so I was safe.
I'm serious.
Grin....how do you like me so far?

So much for serious burial conversations.

LOL!

The more I think about it, I think I want to just be tossed in the ocean when I die. I don't know if that's legal or not. Probably not. But I live on the water and love eating fish and crabs. Why not give something back to all the sea creatures who's relatives died to give me food? Maybe I'll just fall overboard at sea some day. There are worse ways to go.

 

[Lewis]

Rosalia Lombardo died in 1920 and she still looks exactly the same today' as you can see. But there is nothing there' because her spirit is gone. She still looks like a sweet little girl she was 2 when she died. But it was the embalming by Alfredo Salafia that was cutting edge, and just in the last few years was his ingredients found. I have been blow away at how well she is preserved for years. Being that I was going to be a mortician at one time' why wouldn't I be.
Rosalia Lombardo (December 13, 1918 in Palermo, Italy – December 6, 1920), was an Italian child who died of pneumonia. Rosalia's father, Official Mario Lombardo, was sorely grieved upon her death, so he approached Alfredo Salafia, a noted embalmer, to preserve her.[1] Her body was one of the last corpses to be admitted to the Capuchin catacombs of Palermo in Sicily.

Embalming
Thanks to Salafia's embalming techniques, the body was well preserved. X-rays of the body show that all the organs are remarkably intact.[2] Rosalia Lombardo's body is kept in a small chapel at the end of the catacomb's tour and is encased in a glass covered coffin, placed on a wooden pedestal. A 2009 National Geographic photograph of Rosalia Lombardo shows the mummy is beginning to show signs of decomposition, most notably discoloration.[3] To address these issues the mummy was moved to a drier spot in the catacombs, and her original coffin was placed in a hermetically sealed glass enclosure with nitrogen gas to prevent decay.[4][dead link] The mummy is one of the best preserved bodies in the catacombs.

Technique
Recently, the mummification techniques used by Salafia were discovered in a handwritten memoir of Salafia's. Salafia replaced the girl's blood with a liquid made of formalin to kill bacteria, alcohol to dry the body, glycerin to keep her from overdrying, salicylic acid to kill fungi, and zinc salts to give her body rigidity.[5][6][7] Accordingly, the formula's composition is "one part glycerin, one part formalin saturated with both zinc sulfate and chloride, and one part of an alcohol solution saturated with salicylic acid."

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Honestly, for a church that seems to want to be careful to do what God approves of, there are a lot more important things that I can think of that we should be careful to please the Lord with. The instructions we leave for the disposal of our bodies is, IMO, not even on the list.

So let us continue in our daily lives ignoring what we really do know what God wants us to do, but don't seem to get a grip on very well...and don't seem to be very alarmed about and opinionated about as we are things like cremation.

Carry on, church.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Rosalia Lombardo died in 1920 and she still looks exactly the same today' as you can see. But there is nothing there' because her spirit is gone. She still looks like a sweet little girl she was 2 when she died. But it was the embalming by Alfredo Salafia that was cutting edge, and just in the last few years was his ingredients found. I have been blow away at how well she is preserved for years. Being that I was going to be a mortician at one time' why wouldn't I be.
Rosalia Lombardo (December 13, 1918 in Palermo, Italy – December 6, 1920), was an Italian child who died of pneumonia. Rosalia's father, Official Mario Lombardo, was sorely grieved upon her death, so he approached Alfredo Salafia, a noted embalmer, to preserve her.[1] Her body was one of the last corpses to be admitted to the Capuchin catacombs of Palermo in Sicily.

Embalming
Thanks to Salafia's embalming techniques, the body was well preserved. X-rays of the body show that all the organs are remarkably intact.[2] Rosalia Lombardo's body is kept in a small chapel at the end of the catacomb's tour and is encased in a glass covered coffin, placed on a wooden pedestal. A 2009 National Geographic photograph of Rosalia Lombardo shows the mummy is beginning to show signs of decomposition, most notably discoloration.[3] To address these issues the mummy was moved to a drier spot in the catacombs, and her original coffin was placed in a hermetically sealed glass enclosure with nitrogen gas to prevent decay.[4][dead link] The mummy is one of the best preserved bodies in the catacombs.

Technique
Recently, the mummification techniques used by Salafia were discovered in a handwritten memoir of Salafia's. Salafia replaced the girl's blood with a liquid made of formalin to kill bacteria, alcohol to dry the body, glycerin to keep her from overdrying, salicylic acid to kill fungi, and zinc salts to give her body rigidity.[5][6][7] Accordingly, the formula's composition is "one part glycerin, one part formalin saturated with both zinc sulfate and chloride, and one part of an alcohol solution saturated with salicylic acid."

You may want to reconsider your career choice. Mort's make big bucks. And if you're into that kind of thing, why not?

 

[WIP]

One thing that caught my eye in this thread is how many times you all referred to the body as "me". We're talking about what will be done with or our corrupt human flesh and blood.

Personally, I could care less what happens to it. Like an old worn out suit, I won't have any further need of it anymore. God will give me a brand new one that is washed clean and white as snow with his blood and pressed to perfection with his righteousness.

 

[tim-from-pa]

Rosalia Lombardo died in 1920 and she still looks exactly the same today' as you can see. But there is nothing there' because her spirit is gone. She still looks like a sweet little girl she was 2 when she died. But it was the embalming by Alfredo Salafia that was cutting edge, and just in the last few years was his ingredients found. I have been blow away at how well she is preserved for years. Being that I was going to be a mortician at one time' why wouldn't I be.
Rosalia Lombardo (December 13, 1918 in Palermo, Italy – December 6, 1920), was an Italian child who died of pneumonia. Rosalia's father, Official Mario Lombardo, was sorely grieved upon her death, so he approached Alfredo Salafia, a noted embalmer, to preserve her.[1] Her body was one of the last corpses to be admitted to the Capuchin catacombs of Palermo in Sicily.

.........

Doing my genealogical studies a few years back, I naturally had a (morbid) interest in what was under those graves. Besides a skillful embalmer, some people do not decay due to adipocere. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adipocere
I'll wager little Rosalia has a lot of that. The link is just an article, but if your stomach is up to it, you can google some pictures of it. Not everyone with adipocere look as nice as little Rosalia, but the mechanism is the same.

 

[Lewis]

Yes Bodine I dtill am interested in being a mortician, but I am 58 now and the school is near Trenton N.J. and I am in Philly' plus I should have did it 30 years ago when I started to. I still like keeping up on it though' I much more about it' I just don't discuss it here. I have even looked in a retort while a body was being burned' to me there is nothing morbid about it' I mean hey somebody has to do it. I have studied the body and all it's decay modes and the chemical changes that cause it' like anaerobic digestion and putrefaction. But now I think that I am to old to get into it. But I tell you what' in the big cities you will never find a broke undertaker. Most of them live well' because people have to die.

 

[Obadiah]

Honestly, for a church that seems to want to be careful to do what God approves of, there are a lot more important things that I can think of that we should be careful to please the Lord with. The instructions we leave for the disposal of our bodies is, IMO, not even on the list.

So let us continue in our daily lives ignoring what we really do know what God wants us to do, but don't seem to get a grip on very well...and don't seem to be very alarmed about and opinionated about as we are things like cremation.

Carry on, church.

Very, VERY good point. So this morning my prayer after reading this was to ask God to show me if there is something I can possibly do for Him today while I'm still alive. And I'm off to wait on Him.

 

[Obadiah]

...I have even looked in a retort while a body was being burned' to me there is nothing morbid about it' ...

As a policeman I had the same opportunity once at a crematorium that was run by a friend of my partner. He let me watch for as long as I wanted and I had the same feeling. Certainly compared to the decomposing corpses we would get called on that had been found in hot houses or apartments in the summer, cremation was downright glamorous. The intense heat from those gas jets seemed so clean, quick, and sanitary in comparison.

I also found it ironic that since it was in a big city, they had to be careful not to let people in the neighborhood know what they did there and to only do cremations late at night when people wouldn't notice the smoke from the chimney. This was in an area with lots of drug addicts who thought nothing of filling their bodies with horrible poisons that ruined their short lives and had no problem putting a bullet in the body of some other guy on the sidewalk, yet they would totally freak out by some smoke from a chimney if they knew it was a human body burning. Makes no sense to me. Seems like the aversion to cremation is based much more on superstition than on any fact or true word from God.

But hey, today we're still alive. God saw some reason to wake me and the rest of us up again this morning, so let's see what He has in store for all of us today!

 

[jasoncran]

You may want to reconsider your career choice. Mort's make big bucks. And if you're into that kind of thing, why not?

lewis knows a lot periodically he would post this stuff.

 

[Lewis]

Thank you Jason. Okay everyone funerals are for the living they are not for the dead. The Bible say's that the dead know nothing. And they certainly can't smell the flowers or here the preacher, because their time here on earth is over. As long as that person was saved they are okay' and if not ?

 

[Sparkey]

And that brings us to another part of this discussion -- if cremation somehow has an effect, any effect whatsoever, on our heavenly bodies, what about the unsaved or the damned? If God needs us to be "properly buried" to be able to fulfill His promises and if it is against God's will for us to dispose of our bodies in that fashion, are we the only ones who may "transgress God's will" or could sinners disobey God too? What would their consequence be?

 

[Lewis]

Sparrowhawke' God does not need our physical bodies to do what He is going to do. What happens to a saved man when he is blown to bits in a war. This shell of flesh and bones has no more part of anything when we depart our bodies. We came from the earth and we return to it' meaning our bodies. God has set in place a process for our dead bodies to break down' because it is no more of a use to Him. But our spirits are forever.