09-21-2010, 08:37 PM
Dear Lavazza, my condoleances. I can understand you're apprehensive about these talks.
Forgive me for being not that informed about your customs, I understand you will be a pall bearer but not scheduled to speak in any official manner and your worries lie mainly with the unofficial talks that are sure to arise. I respond from this understanding I realize I could be wrong. I'm the guy that thought questioner had an alligator in his washing machine.
Maybe that's also the easy way out. If people want to talk about religion. You can share the thought that since this is a funeral with many people of various religions involved, and religion can be such a hot topic, it would be disrespectful to go into a discussion of that nature. You come off as someone sensitive to the situation. You can avoid trouble while at the same time giving the impression that you are not excluding them from your opinions.
The problem with the situation is that even in the best of circumstances your understanding is going to be far out for at least a few. Maybe others will understand. But you'd have those few to contend with. It's a big day, it's okay to take a step back.
If you do wish to talk without revealing too much, ask them what they believe. Empathize the things you agree with. Console their fears, remind them of God's greatness. And that he sees us with more compassion than we see ourselves. Perhaps a scientifically minded atheist would like to hear that the true miracle lies in the fact that we have lived at all considering all the fuzz with universal constants. (You're still confronting them with the mystery, they just won't know it.)
But the biggest truth I think is that in these occasions people really want to talk. Often it will be the case that if you don't respond to their talk with more talk but with listening they're going to appreciate that. It's what shrinks do
Sharing makes a big emotional difference to people. So just allow them to share and they probably won't notice you're not sharing that much yourself.
The real secret of atheism versus theism is that neither party can prove their point. This is the great equalizer. You have to go deep into philosophy for it but the greatest minds of the world have not answered this question and they have tried for millenia. Neither can be proven and both can be true. It's a great mystery and we know no way to tackle it, other than make a lot of different models.
Forgive me for being not that informed about your customs, I understand you will be a pall bearer but not scheduled to speak in any official manner and your worries lie mainly with the unofficial talks that are sure to arise. I respond from this understanding I realize I could be wrong. I'm the guy that thought questioner had an alligator in his washing machine.
Maybe that's also the easy way out. If people want to talk about religion. You can share the thought that since this is a funeral with many people of various religions involved, and religion can be such a hot topic, it would be disrespectful to go into a discussion of that nature. You come off as someone sensitive to the situation. You can avoid trouble while at the same time giving the impression that you are not excluding them from your opinions.
The problem with the situation is that even in the best of circumstances your understanding is going to be far out for at least a few. Maybe others will understand. But you'd have those few to contend with. It's a big day, it's okay to take a step back.
If you do wish to talk without revealing too much, ask them what they believe. Empathize the things you agree with. Console their fears, remind them of God's greatness. And that he sees us with more compassion than we see ourselves. Perhaps a scientifically minded atheist would like to hear that the true miracle lies in the fact that we have lived at all considering all the fuzz with universal constants. (You're still confronting them with the mystery, they just won't know it.)
But the biggest truth I think is that in these occasions people really want to talk. Often it will be the case that if you don't respond to their talk with more talk but with listening they're going to appreciate that. It's what shrinks do
Sharing makes a big emotional difference to people. So just allow them to share and they probably won't notice you're not sharing that much yourself.
The real secret of atheism versus theism is that neither party can prove their point. This is the great equalizer. You have to go deep into philosophy for it but the greatest minds of the world have not answered this question and they have tried for millenia. Neither can be proven and both can be true. It's a great mystery and we know no way to tackle it, other than make a lot of different models.