It was bound to happen. An extended family member has an inoperable type of fast acting cancer and she'll be gone soon. Perhaps within the year. That means there will be a Christian funeral of the evangelical kind. The worst. Argh.
I've been to many funerals. They all seem to start innocuous at first. There's the eulogy and the friends/family that share their fondest memories. If it stopped right there I would be fine with it; but it goes on. With no exception every service is spent on proselytizing for Jesus. To this day I have yet to understand this. Most of the mourners are already Christian, especially if the dead guy is old. I've looked around during this particular time of the funeral and most people are not paying attention. It's usually the people in the front row, bowing their heads and exclaiming at every other word "Amen!" being totally oblivious to the bored people around them. The hubris of these people and of the minister is astounding to think that someone might find Jesus at the funeral. It rude to think that someone may need Jesus during this time...or is it done on purpose? If so, then that is especially disgusting to me.
The last funeral I attended was for an ancient Aunt who had a very tough life and died with dementia and was blind. I felt very bad for her. I already knew that I was going to be held prisoner for a few minutes and felt that it wouldn't be much of a problem so I went. Big mistake. It was a total waste of my time and I gained nothing out of it. I felt gross and disgusted afterwards and promised myself never to do it again. Never. No exceptions.
This particular relative that is dying has been exceptionally ugly to me. Not to my face, mind you. That's not the Christian way, at least not in my family. Everyone talks about everyone else behind their backs. Many years ago I decided to stop having anything to do with them and their little childish immoral activities. So there's that. But there is also the fact that I don't want to go to another Christian funeral. There is absolutely no regard to non-Christians and I'm tired of wasting my valuable time, usually a whole fucking day, to be a warm body in a church.
So I'm not going to anymore Christian funerals. And most especially this one.
