Paupers - Damned? Or Holy?
I read an article today on Bourque about Funeral Directors in Quebec essentially calling for more government money to help them buy, er, bury poor people.
After they're dead, of course:
LetUsRememberThemAsTheyWeren't-We'llBeRicherForIt
Anyway, it struck me that this latest manipulation of public sentiment to garner public funding is pretty crass.
Mostly because, on first reading, I fell for the notion that Funeral Directors would actually give a rat's ass about poor people, before going through it again and recognizing that infamous Catholic tendency to pay down guilt debts with cash and then get back to business.
Unless that IS their business, in which case they're already there, aren't they.
And I assume these guys are all Catholic. I could be wrong, I suppose, but I'll take that risk, Dear Reader.
Sure, more expensive publicly funded funerals would make life easier - for the living - but I don't see how they would do much for the dead. And call me a heretic, but I can see, quite clearly, that there would be no end in sight to the guilt debt Funeral Directors could collect from the public for burying poor people in a style to which Funeral Directors in Quebec have become accustomed to burying wealthy Catholics but which has nothing to do with how these poor people lived - or how they died.
Which was poor.
And isn't the promise of Catholicism that riches await the poor in heaven?
So, isn't a plan to use public funding to bury poor people in style going to deny them their just reward in heaven? I mean, sure, it's better for Funeral Directors if the poor have more expensive burials, but won't that fuck with their status in heaven where they've been promised a reversal of fortune?
Anyway, I'd be interested to hear The Vatican's position on this because wherever there's money to be made, The Vatican usually has a position. And usually the position is that no expense be spared to pay down that guilt debt. Unless the guilty are priests, of course. Then the guilt debt is absorbed by the poor so their riches will grow in heaven - exponentially. (Interesting, and this is almost off topic, but you never hear from rich people who were sexually abused by priests, do you?)
So yeah, I understand the living wanting to make money off the dead - what else are the dead good for? we might ask ourselves - or Funeral Directors, I guess. I just don't think it's right to turn the whole "the meek shall inherit the Earth" concept on its head once poor people are dead and can't say, "Hey - as in life so it is in death, you rich fuckers! Now throw me in a hole in the ground so I can go to my Great Reward in Heaven!"
And, you know, it's not all about money. Maybe the dead poor had rich inner lives and don't need any after death compensation. Maybe there's no need to use public funds to pay for better funerals for poor people in order to ease a guilt debt we might not even owe. Didja ever think of that, Funeral Directors? Eh? Well? Didja? Hunh?
