On Stubborness and Resurrection

The Best Way Out is Through

Yesterday began with a funeral. A beloved member of our parish, Barbara somehow managed to be a sister and a mother to all of us. (I myself have written her before, about 3/4 of the way through this essay.) She lived only four months between her diagnosis and her death, and so many of us arrived blinking in disbelief.

A Catholic Funeral Mass takes place in the presence of the body of the deceased, and this is good. For one thing, it helps blinking mourners believe that the terrible news is actually true. For another, it allows us all one moment more to see her, to touch her, to tell her goodbye. As we arrived at the door of the church, so did the casket, in a beautiful, pearlized pale color that was almost pink. I was drawn to it with a kind of urgency. Quietly, I kissed two fingers and touched them to an edge.  

In the Catholic tradition, we do not believe the “body is just an empty shell.” No, married to the soul, the body is integral to the person in ways we can only just begin to understand. The Funeral Mass concludes with these words: “In peace, let us take our sister to her place of rest.” Not just “the empty shell left behind,” but her. 

And this is why I wore black. I do believe in resurrection, even in the seemingly impossible resurrection of the body. The Christian tradition says that followers of Jesus are “baptized into his Resurrection,” and we are, after all, in the Easter season, a long recollection of this central hope. But I believe like Job. “I know that my Redeemer lives,” I say, but only right after “My bones cleave to my skin and to my flesh, and I have escaped by the skin of my teeth.” Resurrection is a promise, but it does not erase the sorrow of separation. I am really, really going to miss Barbara.

I have been thinking about the homily, which did what good funeral homilies do: remember the deceased in ways that point us to God. “You will be shocked,” the homilist said, “to hear that Barbara could be stubborn.” A wave of laughter, as we all knew it so well. I know that others, like me, were thinking of the ugly, outright prejudice Barbara faced when she arrived in New England from her birthplace in the Cape Verdean islands. She went to work in the State House, and she could hear the whispers behind her. A Black woman was not a common sight in Rhode Island’s State House in those days, except perhaps as cleaning staff.

But then he went on: “Barbara,” he said, ”was so stubborn that she held onto her stubbornness until it became openness.” And although I had never thought of this this way, it suddenly said everything I knew to be true. Barbara lived with so much strength and determination, but never hard-heartedness. She worked all the way through obstacles and conflicts. She did not just overcome them; she took them into herself, and they became love.

I thought also of Robert Frost’s poem, “A Servant of Servants.” It’s a somewhat mysterious piece, a monologue from a single female speaker. It’s a poem full of difficulties and the hardness of reality. Her husband, the speaker says, likes to tells her that “...the best way out is always through.”

And, she tells us, “I agrees to that, or in so far / As that I can see no way out but through–”

Barbara was like that. Her stubbornness, full of love, always insisted that the best way out was through. 

The sermon was over, and we made our way, as we do, to the altar. We took into ourselves Christ’s body. We waited for him to turn us into love. Then, too quickly, the Mass came to an end. I really would have preferred to linger. I was not ready to say goodbye. But then: “In peace,” the priest said, “let us take our sister to her place of rest.”  We all filed back out, and back to our lives.

I have kept thinking about that homily, though. “She held her stubbornness until it became openness.” I still feel sad, but I am imagining what it might mean to imitate Barbara and to be stubborn, to hold onto that sadness until it becomes joy. 

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And before I go:

(1) This profound reflection from Greg Hillis on bodies, suffering, and hope.

(2) This beautiful, defiant choral performance on the topic of resurrection: