Curious Christian

Just finished reading an article on the changing face of funerals. In it the author asserts:

“It is possible to see all these changes in terms of threats but the alternative is to see them as opportunities and to welcome every request for a Christian funeral service. Some Ministers are very reluctant to conduct such a service for those who were not professing believers and active members of a church. However it is not the Minister who is the ultimate judge of the deceased but the Lord “to whom all hearts are open, all desires known and from whom no secrets are hidden”. In any event, the deceased has passed beyond our reach and those whom the Minister will serve following a death, and to whom he or she will speak at the funeral service, are those who are still alive here on earth.”

As noble as this sounds, I however the caution of ministers in conducting Christian funerals for non-Christians. Because unless they’re universalists there are limits to the comfort they can offer the family of the deceased non-Christian. I’ve seens some ministers handle such situations well, but there is a definite art to it. 

A lurking problem here, that often goes unrecognized by non-Christians even more than Christians, is the Christendom expectation that the church serve as chaplain for society, rather than the seed of an alternate society. This expectation was unhelpful enough when Christendom reigned, but it can go completely pear-shaped in post-Christendom situations.