Cross cultural differences in body remain disposition

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The second participant is Laura Kuroki. She is a 21 year old Catholic from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and has been a practicing Catholic since she can remember. Both of her parents are practicing catholics. Laura went to a Catholic school all her life and grew up with the belief that having a religion regardless of its decent was the foundation to living a successful and happy life. She went on to explain how Catholics go to a weekly mass on Sundays, called the Lord’s Day. She also explained how there are seven sacraments that they learn about while in school and receive at different stages in their lives. The first sacrament they receive is baptism. This is when they are removed from original sin which in the Bible is said that is given by Adam and Eve in the Garden. She continued to speak of the other sacraments such as Reconciliation, Holy Communion, which is what they receive each week, Confirmation and Holy Matrimony. When asked about the question of death, she could only really answer to what happens after death from her beliefs. For Catholics, death is the process of life. Once you pass away, the person’s soul will be evaluated in front of God and the Son, Jesus. This is where as she explained as a deja vaus. Basically, their whole life is reviewed so that it can be determined if they are going to hell, purgatory, or heaven. If the person is sent to purgatory, they will be considered in waiting until it is their time to go to heaven or hell. However, the practices for their burial can all vary. She explained how there is no particular way the burial needs to be. However, Laura was saying how they have a a ceremony before they go to the grave site. This is to commemorate their life and all their accomplishments on Earth. Regardless if they choose to have an open or closed casket, there will be a Priest present to bless the casket before it goes off to the grave site. At the grave site there will a Priest there as well to bless the grave and the casket one last time before it goes into the ground.

Next was the interview with Mr Kutaro Higashi. It was very challenging to interview him because of the language barrier. Nevertheless, he was very informed about the subject of the end of life and body disposition. Mr. Higashi is a Japanese Buddhist. His explications about rituals were very interesting and different from the others. First, he explained that his rituals were not the same for every Buddhist and for everyone in Japan. Kutaro, who is 27 years old, said that he already had five close family members pass away so he knows how difficult it is. However he also knows how the important the rituals are to his family members and how he must abide by them. He described the ceremonies very precisely and showed pictures from his phone. There were three steps in the ceremony, one at home, one at the crematorium and one at the Temple. He explained that they believe that the mind of the death goes away for seven days and wakes up to admire his family and realize their good and bad actions. Seven days later, the King of Death, take them. This is the moment of the reincarnation. For that to happen, he insisted that the body had to be in a certain position during all the ceremonies. He explained that the body has to always be on the right side to imitate the position of Buddha when he pasted away. Then they have to put their left hand on the left thigh and the right hand on the chin. He explained that all these rituals are extremely important if they want the mind to come back. When they want to move the body, they always have to touch the top of the head to let the mind leave the body. When all these steps were finished, the body would then be considered at peace. He explained that in his country, not everyone does the same rituals. In his family, they burn the body. However, in some Japanese families, they put the body remains into the ground in the position of the Buddha.

On the polar opposite spectrum, the two atheists were the only ones who described death with fear and who had a bad representation of death. Cornell Holland, who is from England, explained how his family raised him and how he was taught that death has always been a scary subject. With that, he never really talked about it with his family. He wished knowing more about the subject because it is a moment of the life that everyone is going to live. At the question of how the burial ceremonies were in his country, he responded with, “that all depends of your beliefs and your religion.” In his case, since he is an atheist, he just talked about what he wants with his family. He experienced two deaths in his family where the two ceremonies were extremely different. One was a cremation and an other one was a burial. These choices were decided before the death happened. Furthermore, when he answered the question about how is the disposition of the body, he made an interesting point. He did not know anything about it and just said that there are no specific dispositions. Patrick Lançon, from France, who is also an atheist, had more knowledge about the subject. Nevertheless, as Cornell he did not have a good image of death and was scared about it. He explained him being scared by the fact that he believed in science and not in religion. According to him, after death, there is no chance to come back and heaven does not exist in his eyes. Furthermore, he explained how he lost his mother a few years ago and how he saw her suffering until her last breath. That experience reinforced him being scared of death. He mentioned that him seeing his mom like that made the idea of no God concrete in his mind. Concerning the rituals and the body disposition, like Cornell mentioned, there are nothing special that they must do. Everything depends of each individual. They chose what they wanted and what was better for them and their families.

Aaron Wells is a baptist from Greenville, SC. He went to a methodist church at a very young age but the beliefs are similar as they both are Christian denominations. They both believe in a heaven and hell. Aaron said that their traditions differ slightly; such as methodists have different services on Sunday and value traditions over the Bible. However, both denominations value baptism and he was baptized as a baby by being sprinkled. According to him, baptists many times get baptized again as a reassertion of their faith. He also claimed that baptists typically are embalmed or cremated and it is a personal preference. Aaron said he was probably going to be embalmed and buried in a coffin at a cemetery with his other relatives. This is normal for Christians, he said. They believe that if you repent your sins, then you can always go to heaven. According to Aaron, hell is for those that don’t believe and don’t repent for their sins.

Jeffrey Otto a Christian from Ghana. He certainly had the