Burried or cremated?

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Burried or cremated?

Postby Q. C. Locatus Barbatus on Fri Oct 17, 2003 7:25 pm

Salvete!

Ironically enough the only certainty in life is that we are going to die. Maybe this is a bit of a 'borderline' question (it could be handled in some of our collegia), but when the time has come would you rather be burried or cremated? Or mumified? and why?

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Postby Quintus Aurelius Orcus on Fri Oct 17, 2003 8:15 pm

Salve Locate

I think there should be another option: donating your body to science. Anyway i chose cremation. That way my relatives would not have to continue to pay for the land i'm buried in. Its a financially a benefet for the onces you leave behind to be cremated. But that is not why i chose this option. If i die one day, i don't want my body to be abused by some sick psychos with necrophiliac tendencies. lol. I chose this option because i felt that this is the right way to do for me when i die. Donating my body to science: no thank you. Ofcourse if i'm in a hospital when i die and some of my organs can be used to save another, than they can take whatever they can use, but that is it. The idea of mumification does nothing to me. Maybe if i'm some sorth of sick sadistic serial killer who wants to kill his victims through mumification :twisted: . No the idea of mumification doesn't appeal to me. Being buried does not appeal to me either so i will stick with cremation.
This question, i think, has both a theological and a philosophical content and importance.
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Postby Gnaeus Dionysius Draco on Sat Oct 18, 2003 6:43 pm

I would like to be:

(1) launched into space. This is a crazy idea and I know it. But what if I was discovered by an extraterrestial race? I would become of enormous scientific value. A permanent representant of the human race in space.

(2) buried in a forest, along with seeds of flowers and/or trees. It would be beautiful to see my old self give life to new life even after I'm dead. Unfortunately, practises like these are forbidden.

(3) cremated, mostly for the reasons Romulus listed.

Valete,
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Postby Q. C. Locatus Barbatus on Fri Oct 31, 2003 11:38 am

Salvete!


Draco wrote:A permanent representant of the human race in space.


Save us from this disaster! Please stop all extraterrestrial voyages until this man has been burnt! I wouldn't like to be thought of by aliens as someone like Draco! Save the human race from this humiliation!

Au contraire, I would suggest that we launch me into space (when I'm dead) so that a genius can represent our species in space! 8)

No, seriously, I really do not know which option I would choose. Indeed, as Romulus says, I would like to donate any useful organ to the medical science (as far as my organs are still useful, as I think at all the alcohol, drugs, fat and nicotine that already have disappeared in it!), to help other people. But burried or cremated?

One the one hand it is nice to have your own little place that still is yours after your death. By which I mean: a grave is something visible and touchable for any predecessors. And especially around this time (november) when the tradition of cleaning and visiting the graveyards still exists.

With cremation there is no longer a visible spot for you on this earth. Some relatives can have problems with that. I do not feel very well about ash being placed in a wall. I always have to think about appartment-buildings when I see these walls with far too many names on.
But cremation is more poetic, more beautiful than a burial. Gone with the wind... That's why I think I would choose for cremation.

Valete!

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Postby Horatius Piscinus on Sun Nov 02, 2003 3:49 am

Salvete

Em...er...well. I was a bit amused earlier this year with my wife's obvious embarassment at brining up this very topic. You see she is a Christian, one of those sheltered Catholic girls, and is aware that I would not appreciate a Christian funeral rite, but does not know what I would consider appropriate. I suppose the question came up after my doctors spoke with her and she learned just how serious my condition can be. Someday I suppose I shall have to write out what rite would be appropriate for her to conduct for me.

Anyway, I think I would most prefer to simply go off into a deep woods to die since I feel most comfortable when alone in a forest. And then it would be left to Nature to decide how to dispose of this vehicle. Other than that I would prefer to abide with my family's tradition, which is cremation. My mother made her own urn, someone in the family is suppose to make our urns, and for the longest while her ashes were kept on a shelf in her house as part of the family shrine, our lararium you might call it. Eventually it was decided to return her ashes to her parents. This was only appropriate. For a very long time she had refused to die until one night she had a vision of her family Lares radient in white and inviting her to join with them. So the majority of her ashes were distributed beneath a tree where her parents and grandparents have their remains, while other portions of her are within our laraia. I keep my mementoes of her in a small shoe she wore as an infant. Also in my lararium are mementoes of my children, both my sons who are still alive and my other sons who died years ago. I suppose the same will be done with me someday, a portion buried, as is proper, a portion cremated and distributed out, part to the laraia of my descendents, and the major portion back to my mother's family shrine from whence I came.

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