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November 1986 A Journal of Atheist News and Thought
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A M ER IC AN A TH E IS TS
isa non-profit, non-political, educational organization dedicated to the complete and absolute separation of state
and church. We accept the explanation ofThomas Jefferson that the First Amendment to the Constitution of the
United States was meant to create a wall of separation between state and church.
American Atheists is organized to stimulate and promote freedom of thought and inquiry concerning religious
beliefs, creeds, dogmas, tenets, rituals, and practices;
to collect and disseminate information, data, and literature on all religions and promote a more thorough
understanding of them, their origins, and their histories;
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to advocate, labor for, and promote inalllawfulways the establishment and maintenance ofa thoroughly secular
system of education available to all;
to encourage the development and public acceptance ofa human ethical system stressing the mutual sympathy,
understanding, and interdependence of all people and the corresponding responsibility of each individual in
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Materialism declares that the cosmos is devoid of immanent conscious purpose; that it is governed by its own
inherent, immutable, and impersonal laws; that there is no supernatural interference in human life;that man -
findinghis resources within himself - can and must create his own destiny. Materialism restores to man his dignity
and his intellectual integrity. It teaches that we must prize our lifeon earth and strive always to improve it. It holds
that man is capable of creating a social system based on reason and justice. Materialism's faith is in man and
man's ability to transform the world culture by his own efforts. This is a commitment which is in its very essence
life-asserting. It considers the struggle for progress as a moral obligation and impossible without noble ideas that
inspire man to bold, creative works. Materialism holds that humankind's potential for good and for an outreach to
more fulfillingcultural development is, for all practical purposes, unlimited.
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American Atheists - P.O. Box 2117 - Austin, TX 78768-2117
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November
1986
Vol 28, No.
11
m e r i c n t h e i s t
Journal of Atheist News and Thought
Editor's Desk
R. Murray-O'Hair
Director's Briefcase
Jon G. Murray
Mr. Murray writes of the ramifications
of Biting the Final Biscuit.
Ask A .A .
A discussion of tax-deductible dona-
tions may give you cause to write a few
checks before the end of the year.
A Special Section on Funerals
Have you sometimes wondered how
to avoid religion at the very end of
life? Atheists of all kinds give their
perspectives on Atheist burials and
funerals. '
Plotting Atheist Funerals - The
grande dame of Atheism, Madalyn
O'Hair, lends her thoughts on how funer-
als should be conducted. - 8
An Atheist Cemetery - An account
of the only Atheist cemetery in the U.S.
and the philosophy behind it. - 16
When Atheists Die - Frank Zindler
gives some moving examples of how
wellmemorials can be held without reli-
gion. -18
Grave Robbery - The banditry of
the funeral industry is unmasked by
Brian Lynch. - 22 .
The Final Page - How do Atheists
react to death? Gerald Tholen provides
a few examples. - 25
2
A Course in Claptrap
Nevin Hawkins
A short critique of some very, very silly
metaphysics.
26
27
33
34
36
37
40
41
42
44
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Blasphemy (part II)
Law and order were not the order of
the day a hundred years ago when an
Atheist and freedom of speech were
tried.
Poetry
8
Report from India
Margaret Bhatty
The Indian government is trying. to
clean up the sacred Ganges. But is it
brave enough to stop the real source of
pollution - dead bodies?
Historical Notes
American Atheist Radio Series
Madalyn O'Hair
E. Haldeman-Julius was one of our
nation's earliest and most prolific Athe-
ist publishers.
Book Review
There's trouble in Baptist-land.
Me Too
Letters to the Editor
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Cover Art by Christopher Dunne
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November 1986 Page 1
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m e r i c n t h e i s t
Editor/R. Murray-O'Hair
Editor Emeritus/Dr. Madalyn O'Hair
Managing Editor/don G_Murray
Assistant Editor/Gerald Tholen
Poetry/Angeline Bennett, Gerald Tholen
Non-Resident Staff/John M_Allegro, Burnham
P_Beckwith, Margaret Bhatty, Nawal ElSaadawi,
Merrill Holste, Lowell Newby, Fred Woodworth,
Frank R. Zindler
Production Staff/Laura Lee Cole, Christina Dit-
ter, Shantha Elluru, Keith Hailey, Brian J. Lynch,
Jim Mills, John Ragland, Virginia Schlesinger,
George Thomas
Officers of the Society of Separationists, Inc.
President/Jon G. Murray
President Emeritus/Dr. Madalyn O'Hair
Vice-President/Gerald Tholen
Secretary/R. Murray-O'Hair
Treasurer/Brian J. Lynch
Chairman of the Board/Dr. Madalyn O'Hair
Members of the Board/Jon G. Murray (Vice
Chairman), August Berkshire, Herman Harris,
Ellen Johnson, Scott Kerns, Minerva Massen,
Robin Murray-O'Hair, Shirley Nelson, Richard C.
O'Hair, Henry Schmuck, Noel Scott, Gerald
Tholen, Lloyd Thoren, Frank Zindler.
Officers and Directors may be reached at P.O.
Box 2117, Austin, TX 78768.
Honorary Members of the Board/Merrill
Holste, John Marthaler
The American Atheist is published monthly by
American Atheist Press, an affiliate of Society of
Separationists, Inc., d/b/a American Atheists,
2210Hancock Dr., Austin, TX 78756-25%, a non-
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Copyright 1986by Society of Separationists, Inc.
All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in
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The Americ an A th ei st is indexed in IBt{1nterna-
t ional Bibliography o f Per iod ica l L i te rature, Os-
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Manuscripts submitted must be typed, double-
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The American Atheist Press publishes a variety of
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Page 2
EDITOR S DESK / R. Murray-O'Hair
M IX ED R EP L IES
W
e at The American Atheist Center
have often toyed with the idea of a
book titled Questions From Atheists
which would answer typical questions Athe-
ists have asked which have never been ade-
quately answered. Atheists from around the
country and the world inquire with the same
questions. And we answer each individually
as often from our hearts as from our heads, if
at all.But some of the questions, poignantiy
full of necessity, so often asked, are nearly
impossible to answer patiy.
One such question, very often heard at
The Center, is What do we, Atheists, do for
funerals? Our culture's means of dealing
with death are so saturated with religion that
the Atheist, having opted out of theism
completely, is most often entirely excluded
from traditional expressions of mourning.
So we thought to face that problem -
perhaps not once and for all, but certainly
once. We thought to giveAtheists a range of
options for composing funerals.
But as our authors considered the matter,
it became clear that our very Atheism pre-
vented us from giving our readers a stylized
response to the trying circumstances of fac-
ing death. For inAtheism is a recognition of
the individual, an emphasis on his or her
importance that is in opposition to the reli-
gious emphasis on a god. Each unique per-
son, our authors felt, needed a final fare-
well reflecting his or her life.It became clear
as we worked that we could only offer
examples, not guidelines.
We recognize that for grieving persons
such an approach is not entirely helpfuL
Individuals in pain may prefer to retreat to
the formulaic. But we did not feel that we
could offer the formulaic to alL
Perhaps this issue of our magazine will
open up a discussion of the facing of death
which will lead to better solutions, for the
individuals and the group, than have been
found in the past. We hope for this as we
present this multitude ofapproaches to you.
To begin is an article by the woman often
called The Atheist, Madalyn O'Hair. In
Plotting Atheist Funerals, she deals with
legal and individual aspects ofdisposal ofthe
dead. Concluding there is no single Atheist
response to death, she discusses how she
would have her own funeral handled.
We could not overlook a description of
the United States' only Atheist cemetery.
An Atheist Cemetery describes its ap-
proach and reproduces its application form.
November 1986
Frank Zindler gives a taste of funeral
ceremonies he has conducted. His poetic
examples are in When Atheists Die.
Atheists have never been persons to
ignore reality - including the financial reali-
ties of death. Brian Lynch critiques the fu-
neral industry in Grave Robbery.
In The Director's Briefcase, Jon Murray
presents Biting the Final Biscuit, an
attempt to cover a number of aspects of
death, dying, funerals, and burials.
Finally Gerald Tholen provides The Final
Page, a moving account of an Atheist's
reaction to death.
Interspersed are various delicate poems
reflecting an Atheistic attitude to death.
Pray forgive us for trying to lighten the
subject with a cartoon or two. Death is such
an emotionally-laden topic that any handling
of it is likely to upset, offend. Keeping in
mind that some may cry out against our
treatment as tasteless, we felt a need to
encourage a more matter-of-fact handling of
death through a bit of humor.
We often try to schedule the publication
of special features with an appropriate sea-
sonal event. For example, our feature on the
rearing of Atheist youth appeared in the
year's most youthful month, January; our
articles on weddings appeared during the
traditional month to wed, June. But we had
difficulty in choosing the appropriate
month for a funeral issue. Surely, we
thought, the feature should not appear in
December, the month for celebrations; nor
February, the month for lovers; nor March,
April, or May, months for birth and renewal;
nor July, a month for Americans to celebrate.
October, the month of Halloween, seemed
gauche. In the end, by default, we settled on
November for our feature on Atheist funeral
procedures (we shy from the word services
with its religious connotations).
Perhaps we accidentally made the correct
decision. For in the various essays in this
issue you will see Atheists insist on the
recognition of death as a natural event, not
to be avoided, not to be feared, not to be
anticipated, but to be accepted - just as we
accept the small deaths of the fall season.
We watch lush greenery fallto provide room
and humus for a new generation - and
understand the necessity of the process.
Just so, the authors felt, we must not deny
the reality of and need for the end of individ-
ual lives, no matter how we express our
sorrow and respect for dead companions.
American Atheist
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D IR E C T O R S B R IE F C A SE Jon G. Murray
BITING THE FINAL BISCUIT
A
frequently asked question ofThe Amer-
ican Atheist Center is, What should
anAtheist do with respect to the many ques-
tions surrounding death? Ifone isan Athe-
ist and has a family member or person
known to one die, how should one comport
oneself?Ifan Atheist dies, what should those
who survive do with respect to disposal of
the body? Should there be a service, and if
so, of what should it consist? These are all
complex questions because they involve a
highly personal and emotional issue. Indi-
viduals react differently when faced with a
death, whether their own potential one or
someone else's actual one. Generally, reac-
tion to death as a subject is dependent on
one's total background and lifeperceptions
and on an individual fact situation. The
American Atheist faces, in dealing with the
topic of death, somewhat the same problem
as it faced in dealing with the subject of
marriage. Marriage is a highly personalized
matter of opinion and taste which differs
widelyfrom individual to individual.
Even when itcomes to taking statistics or
asking questions about death, the nature of
the subject matter, as a subjective consider-
ation, interferes with the statistical process
and casts doubt on the validity of the con-
clusions reached. This same problem exists
when doing surveys about god beliefs or
concepts. Each person surveyed willdefine
god in his own unique way. A question
like, What is death? willlikely net one as
many different answers as persons asked.
Varied Responses
In 1974Warren Shibles, then an instruc-
tor at the University of Wisconsin - White-
water, published a book entitled Death, An
Interdisciplinary Analysis. In that book,
Shibles starts out by attempting to analyze
fifty-fivequestions which were answered by
forty-nine of his students at the beginning of
an undergraduate philosophy seminar on
death in the spring of 1972 at University of
Wisconsin - Whitewater. Shibles's look at
the questions and their answers takes up the
first thirty-five pages of his book, and I can-
not present that entire analysis in this
column. I can try to give the highlights of
what Shibles found from just one class of
students. Mr. Shibles has ten books on var-
ious philosophical and sociological topics in
print from The Language Press, but this par-
Austin, Texas
ticular title,
Death,
is now out of print.
Each student had his or her own concept
of the definition of the term death, from 3
cessation of bodily functions to like being
bored. To the question Can you imagine
your own death? halfof the class answered
no. Is death necessary, or is it a disease
which man may be able to conquer? drew
an equally divided response from it can be
eliminated completely to it is neither
necessary nor conquerable - itjust exists.
The majority had immediate personal
experiences with death, but when asked
Have you discussed death (a) with your
family? (b) with others? one-sixth had not
discussed death at all. Most had discussed
it in terms of heaven, hell, reincarnation,
afterlife, and the religious context.
Have you ever wanted to die? drew a
yes answer from twenty-eight students. Most
of the reasons given centered around bore-
dom or the futility of life.This was followed
by the question Have you ever or do you
contemplate suicide? to which twenty-two
students answered yes. The related ques-
tion Should one have a right to take his own
life? drew thirty-two yes responses.
On fear of death, twenty-one out of the
class answered yes to the direct question
Do you fear death? Fifteen ofthe students
believed in immortality and that they have
a soul. Seventeen believed in reincarna-
tion and nineteen did not, while sixteen said
that they did hope for life after death, with
eight saying no. Twenty-six said that they
did not want to know when they would die,
and eight said they would like to know.
Forty-two said they would want the doctor
to tell them if they had a terminal illness,
while five said they would prefer not to
know.
With regard to the question Do you
pray? twenty said no, while nineteen said
yes. Then, curiously, to the question Do
you think you can be punished for your sins
after death? twenty-nine said no, four yes,
and three were not sure.
Next to last, question number fifty-four,
Do you think most people are honest in
their statements about death? was an-
swered no by twenty students and yes by
only seven.
What can we conclude from all of these
questions to a single class ofundergraduates
in Wisconsin? Little or nothing that can be
applied to the majority of the population.
November 1986
Attitudes on death and dying are personal,
fact situation determined, and even chang-
ing from time to time throughout a given
individual's lifetime.
As you can see from the samples given,
the reaction of the class to the topic of death
was a mixed one. Each student had a sepa-
rate opinion on each question - an opinion
not necessarily related to any other ques-
tion. Many of them have probably changed
their minds since 1972ifthey could be found
and asked the same set of questions again.
This isan area, from my point ofview, that is
not amenable to statistical analysis. It iseasy
to ask questions of groups or persons large
and small that lend themselves to definite
yes and no answers without qualification or
personal experiences, outlooks, and inter-
pretations being a valuable part of a com-
plete answer to the question. One can ask,
for example, Do you own a motor vehicle?
and get a reliable count from the total sur-
vey, but ifyou ask, Why own a motor vehi-
cle? that requires a qualitative rather than a
quantitative response. The answers willbe
divergent and difficult to correlate and to
draw any substantive conclusions from.
Iwould say, however, that a safe assump-
tion is that everyone has thought about the
subject of death at one time or the other -
whether or not they will admit to having
done so in a survey. It is a natural subject of
curiosity regardless ofwhether derived from
spontaneous curiosity or brought on by a
personal experience with death. The re-
sponse to that curiosity is a subjective con-
sideration and is not necessarily related to
an understanding of what death is from
any kind of scientific perspective.
Death's Definition
Death can be defined medically as the
permanent cessation ofthe vital functions in
the bodies of animals and plants, or slight
variations thereof. That is a pretty straight-
forward definition. Even more simply, death
isthe end oflife.That isalland nothing more.
Archaeologists and anthropologists for the
most part agree that death from natural
causes was inexplicable to primitive man in
the savage state, that in all times in all
lands, ifhe reflects on death at all, man fails
to understand that it is a natural phenom-
enon, that in its presence he is awed or
curious. This indifference is not dictated by
Page 3
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Il
t
•• iI v
1\0.
••, dread returning to that lonelq, silent house with no bitching, belching,
snoring, or farting.
any realization that death means annihila-
tion of the personality. The savage concep-
tion of a future state is one that involves no
real break inthe continuity oflife as he leads
it. There isuniversal refusal ofsavage man to
accept death as the natural end of li,fe.If a
man dies without being wounded he is con-
sidered to be the victim of spirits of some
sort. This animistic tendency was a marked
characteristic ofprimitive man inevery land.
The savage explains the processes of inani-
mate nature by assuming that livingbeings
or spirits, possessed of capacities similar to
his own, are within the inanimate object. He
explains to himself the phenomena ofhuman
lifein a likemanner, believing that each man
has within him a kind of mannikin or
animal which dictates his actions inlife.This
miniature internal man is the savage's
conception ofa soul. Sleep or trances are
then regarded as the temporary absence of
this soul and death as the permanent
absence thereof. Each person isperceived in
the primitive mind as having a dual exis-
tence, with the soul of dual man having
many names and forms. One common belief
isthat the body's shadow or reflection isthe
soul. When a man issick inmany primitive
cultures he issaid to have lost his shadow or
at least a part ofit. This reflection or shadow
soul is thought, in many cultures, to be
subject to enemies or attacks givingrise to a
Page 4
host of associated superstitions. Most com-
monly in a cross-cultural analysis the soul
is perceived as being man's breath (or
anima, the root word for animal). The term
last breath and the use ofthe word breath as
a synonym for
life
expresses the savage
beliefthat there departs from the body ofthe
dying something tangible, capable of sepa-
rate existence.
As a direct result of the inability of the
savage mind inallages and inalllocations to
comprehend death as a natural phenome-
non, there results a universal tendency to
personify death, and myths are thus in-
vented to account for itsorigin. The point of
this littleanthropology lesson isthat the atti-
tude of even so-called civilized man
towards death has been in a great part dic-
tated by the savage belief that to die is
unnatural. This is the crux of the differen-
tiation between the Atheist position with
respect to death and that of the theist. The
theist continues to build on a mythological
structure based on the false premise that
death isan unnatural act. The Atheist rec-
ognizes death as a natural process that is
simply the termination oflife.Once that real-
ization is attained, there is no need for the
fabrication ofstories as to the cause or effect
of death. It is simply accepted as an inevita-
ble natural phenomenon.
I see no need, as an Atheist, to become
November 1986
emotionally distraught over a natural phe-
nomenon, no matter how closely it occurs to
me in terms of personal relationships. It is
simply not rational to allow the death of
another to significantly interfere with one's
own life. No one will deny that there is a
period of adjustment and remorse and a
sense of something being missing when
someone with whom one has a close per-
sonal relationship dies. It is the inability of
the vast majority to be able to cope with that
adjustment period without turning outside
ofreality to some type ofmysticism or chem-
ical stimulation that fosters the continuance
ofreligion. I do not viewbeing able to handle
death emotionally something for only the
tough John Wayne image individual. Cop-
ingwith death isbased on a realization of the
fact that it is a natural phenomenon and
nothing more. Once one fallsinto the trap of
thinking otherwise then all of the excess
emotional baggage of guilt, sin, souls, after-
life,reincarnation, and grief can pileup quite
easily. Ifthe natural premise is relinquished,
one can build an incredible nightmare on the
ruins.
One of my fellow columnists in this very
issue of this journal seems to feel that a
gathering of those concerned upon an indi-
vidual's death and some type ofceremony is
necessary to help them reorder their lives in
the absence ofthe deceased. This columnist
feels that one must restructure one's lifeto
compensate for the deceased individual. I
disagree. Idon't think that any kind of gath-
ering or ceremony isnecessary at the time of
a death whatsoever other than the persons
who are required to dispose of the body in a
particular manner. Many kinds ofgatherings
are possible, but they should not be thought
of interms ofa psychological crutch. Itis an
emotionally unstable person indeed whose
life structure is so dependent on the exis-
tence of another that it would need to be
radically restructured upon the dependee's
death.
Disposal Concerns
Once an individual has died, the most
immediate consideration is disposal of the
body. The three simplest ways ofdoing that
are (1) burial inthe ground, (2)cremation, or
(3)throwing the corpse into a body ofwater.
Inactuality itwould not make any difference
to the rest of the animals on the earth, other
than the human ones, ifthe body was simply
allowed to decay where it fell or simply
dragged offinto the countryside and allowed
to decay and fall subject to scavengers. In
fact every other animal other than man falls
prey to scavengers and/or natural decay
upon death. Only man embalms or other-
wise attempts to preserve or protect the
dead body. The disposition ofthe body after
death isin both a legal and practical tradition
the providence of the next of kin -
American Atheist
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regardless of the wishes expressed by the
deceased prior to death either orally or in a
written willor testament. The surviving fam-
ilymembers can do with the body what they
willwithin the scope of current
law,
That is
not to say that the wishes of the deceased
should not be taken into account. When my
grandfather died mymother saw to itthat he
had a traditional funeral with a Presbyterian
minister officiating despite the fact that we
were Atheists because that is what he
would have wanted. The disposal of his
body was carried out in accordance with his
lifephilosophy - not his daughter's, which I
think was correct. Her father did not know
what she had done, but it gave her peace of
mind at the immediate time of her father's
death to carry out services in accordance
with what she knew he would have desired,
As an Atheist, it makes the most sense to
me to dispose of a dead body in the most
simple way possible. Digginga hole and plac-
ing the nude body therein and fillingin the
hole with dirt is the best method to mymind.
Clothing the body or putting it into some
kind of protective receptacle or trying to
chemically preserve it is ludicrous. All of
those things are superfluous. Cremation or
burial at sea (as itis called) are also practi-
cal, depending on the location and imme-
diate circumstances of the death. I see no
need for any kind ofgrave marker either; it
is just a waste of stone or other natural
resource. What is the sense of knowing
where to return to stand over or near
the dead person? Speaking of wasting
resources, I must drive past a very large
, municipal cemetery on the way from my
home to The American Atheist Center each
day. Today Isaw the sprinklers watering the
grass around the tombstones, despite the
fact that Austin, Texas, is in the midst of a
severe drought and our city council has
imposed mandatory water rationing. Why
waste much needed water on the grass in a
cemetery? Cemeteries usually also occupy
prime, should-be-commercial real estate.
I am occasionally accused, needless to
say, ofbeing a hard, cruel, heartless, unfeel-
ing, unloving person who lacks emotion. I '
am none of the foregoing, but Isee no need
to become hysterical or show wildemotion
at a death. When people cry, moan, engage
in the biblical-type wailing and gnashing of
teeth, and carryon at funerals, for whose
benefit is the display - the deceased? The
deceased is no longer capable of caring
about what is said or done in his or her
immediate vicinity. All funerals, from an
Atheist analysis, are for the benefit of the
living, not the dead. The religionists, on the
other hand, hold funerals for the benefit of
the deceased to ensure the proper disposal
ofthe soul, sending iton its journey to the
hoped-for location. The practical purpose of
a gathering when a death occurs is for those
who knew the deceased personally to have
Austin, Texas
physical proof that the individual is indeed
dead. This isan archaic hang-over from the
days of lesser communication ability. Prior
to cameras, telegraphs, and telephones,
etc., relatives and those concerned, particu-
larly in a legal sense as beneficiaries of an
estate, had to actually travel to see the body
to confirm death had occurred. In modern
terms it makes more sense for persons,
especially families, to get together for other
social reasons with each other while they are
stillalivethan to wait for a death inthe family
to be used as an excuse to get together.
Ithas also disturbed me that many people
can only express their true sentiments about
another after the person isdead. It seems to
me that personal relationships should be
such that one could tell another what one
truly thinks about them to their face and not
wait until after death. It does no good to tell
someone that you love them or hate
them in terms of the ongoing nature of a
personal relationship after they are dead.
One woman I knew' was a case in point.
Upon her husband's death she refused to
attend the burial services because she had
hated him for the entire duration of their
marriage - or so she said. It would have
made a great deal more sense for her to have
expressed those feelings to him while he was
alive.
If anything is to be done in terms of a
ceremony or gathering for a death, the
occasion should not be a time for mourning
or tears or sadness. Itshould be ifanything a
time to reflect upon the accomplishments
and character ofthe deceased during hislife.
A ceremony, if there need be one for what-
soever reason, should only consist of the
giving of a biographical synopsis of the
accomplishments and failures of the de-
ceased's life from the point of view of the
deceased or as near as possible to avoid a
judgmental rendition of that biographical
sketch. Some members of the groups
attending such a ceremony may enjoy music
or find itemotionally soothing. Inthat case, I
feel that it is most appropriate to play the
favorite music of the deceased, which may
add to the understanding ofthe biographical
sketch for those in attendance.
I am often asked by religionists what will
happen to me when I die. My reply is that I
willrot, simply that and nothing more. Ioften
add two concepts to that. First, I usually
draw an analogy to death as the destruction
of an ordinary audiocassette on which a
, voice has been recorded. Ifthat cassette is
set afire and consumed thereby, where did
the soul or personality that was on that
tape gowhen the physical receptacle was no
longer? It did not go anywhere. In a like
manner, when a physical body permanently
. ceases to have vital functions, the individual
personality that was associated with that
body ceases to be, except in the memories
of those who knew the deceased. In this
November 1986
technological age, one can also be immor-
talized, as the saying goes, on video- or
, audiotape. Second, Itell them that my death
will be of no greater or lesser significance
than a dead leaf falling from a tree in the
autumn and that it should not be granted
any more significance by those who survive
me. In addition, I like to taunt their little
religious minds by asking them how they
intend to enjoy a heaven or suffer in a hell
with no bodies, the soul being conceived
of as ephemeral. With what eyes will they
see their god? With what ears willthey hear
angels sing? With what sex organs, in the
case of the Mormons, will they procreate?
Their reply is usually stunned silence.
Funeral Costs
One ofthe most enlightening books Ihave
ever read regarding ceremonies associated
with death, that was a large part of the
development of my convictions concerning
funerals, was The American Way of Death
by Jessica Mitford (Simon and Schuster,
1963). One of the things that shocked me
most in this book was the extraordinary
amount of time, effort, and money that
Americans put into ceremonies for the dead.
A few examples from the book will suffice.
These figures are all from the 1960s, so that
they will need to be updated in terms of
inflation or current cost-of-living indexes.
According to the 1986Statistical Abstracts
ofthe United States, taking the 1%7 buying
power of the dollar as the constant, a 1984
dollar only has 32.1 cents worth ofpurchas-
ing power today. That means that what one
could buy in 1967 for $1.00, in terms of con-
sumer goods', costs an average consumer in
1984 $3.12. With that adjustment in mind,
according to 1961 funeral industry figures
from Mitford's book, the average undertak-
er's billin that year was $1,450.00. In terms
of 1984 dollars that would be $4,524.00.
According to the U.S. Department of
Commerce census of business under the
heading of personal expenditure for death
expense, in 1960Americans spent $1.6 bil-
lion ($4.99billionin 1984dollars) on funerals,
as revealed in Mitford's book. The author
goes on to add that that figure, averaged out
among the number of deaths in 1960,
amounted to $942.00 for the funeral of
every man, woman, child, and stillborn babe
who died inthe United States. Mitford also
points out that the figure of $1.6 billion
averages out to $1,160_00for each regular
adult funeral. Mitford says that the De-
, partment ofCommerce figure isactually low
because it fails to take into account such
extras as funds for the burial ofindigents,
shipping ofthe dead bytrain or plane, funer-
• al flowers, and the purchase of graves and
mausoleum crypts for future occupancy.
She concludes that: It would be a conserva-
tive guess that these extras, if added to the
Pag~5
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Commerce Department's base figure of$1.6
billion,would bring the nation's burial billto
wellover $2 billion. In terms of 1984dollars
that comes out to about $6.24 billion. The
most startling figure then drops likea bomb-
shell out of the pages of Mitford's book on
the reader:
Personal expenditures for allhigher
education - tuition, books, and living
expenses for 3.6 million students
enrolled in colleges and graduate
schools in 1960- came to $1.9 billion,
which is a little less than Americans
spent to bury 1.7 million dead in the
same year. ... The cost of providing
medical care for the aged, the 17 mil-
lion Americans who are 65 or older,
under a medical-hospital insurance
program, would be less than the
annual cost of dying in the United
States.
I am sure that the same situation exists
today - only exacerbated by population
and inflation figures and the fact that we
have a statistically older population now
which means more per capita deaths each
year in the 1980s than in the 1960s.
I was stunned when I read Mitford's book
incollege, and Iam stillstunned to think that
the sick religious rituals surrounding death
mean more to Americans than education or
health for the living.
A Time To Change
In conclusion, I feel that we, as Atheists,
need to do what we can to lead the nation
out of its mania over death. We must dem-
onstrate that no one passes away (where
to?), is dearly departed, gives up the
ghost, is gone, is missing, has passed
over, has gone to his/her reward, rests
in peace, or any other religious term, but
has simply died. It is up to each of us
through our personal actions at the time of
death of a fellow Atheist to make a point of
letting the survivors know that death is a
natural phenomenon and that we, as ani-
mals, are all simply part of a continuing life
cycle and nothing more. Death isa reality as
is birth, and it need not be coped with or
adjusted to ; it simply is.
I can remember the showing of a home
movie of the burial of an Atheist inmate by
Arnold Via ofVirginia, founder ofthe Prison
Atheist League of America, at a past Ameri-
can Atheist convention. (See Recycling of
an Atheist,
American Atheist,
October
1983.) Mr. Via picked up the inmate's body,
wrapped in plastic, at the prison. He hauled
itto his acreage inthe bed ofan open pickup
truck, dug a hole in the woods, tied a rope
around the neck of the body and dragged it
to that hole, unwrapped it, kicked it in, and
then filledinthe dirt. Many ofthe Atheists in
the audience were horrified and complained
later to both Mr. Via and officials at the
convention. I saw absolutely nothing wrong
with the way in which Mr. Via handled that
burial. He was simply disposing of the
remains of a dead animal and nothing more.
Many of you will say, But he could have
done so with more dignity I reply, Dignity
for whom? Did the corpse care?
Personally, I couldn't care less what is
done with my body upon death. The only
request that Icould imagine havingis that no
religious ceremonies of any kind be con-
ducted. Many Atheists express concerns
about having unwanted services of a reli-
gious nature performed over their remains.
It may be of interest here that even if you
make arrangements to leave your body to a
university, medical school, or organ bank,
that many of those institutions will hold
prayer services over the body prior to dis-
section, then cremate and/or bury the
remains with religious ceremonies. But what
if there were religious mumbling said over
my remains? Would I know the difference?
No, and neither would any other deceased
Atheist, and there is nothing that one can
really do legally to prevent such an oc-
currence.
As an Atheist, I plan to live my life to the
fullest, being cognizant all the while that if is
finite. The fact that I must die eventually
makes each day that I do live and enjoy life
without the mental reservations that inhibit
the religionist from doing likewise precious
tome. ~
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A second generation Atheist,
Mr. Murray has been the director
of The American Atheist Center
for ten years and is also the managing
editor of the American Atheist. He
advocates Aggressive Atheism.
Hang up your spurs at the 17th
Annual National Convention of
American Atheists
Held April 17, 18, and 19
(Friday, Saturday, and Sun-
day of Easter Weekend), the
1987 American Atheist Con-
vention will take place at
the Radisson Hotel Denver.
As it is every year, the con-
vention will be three days of
excitement, comradery, and
education.
But Denver - ski capital
that it is - can be a busy place
in April. So to make sure you
don't miss this experience, it's
best to make your arrangements
early.
The Radisson Hotel Denver is offer-
ing conventioneers the very special
rates of $44.12 per night - tax included
- for a single or double. A triple room will
cost just $55.29 per night - again, tax
Page 6
included. Please make your accommodation arrange-
ments directly with the Radisson Denver, 1550 Court
Place, Denver, CO 80202; (303) 893-3333.
Suggested carriers to the Denver Stapleton
Airport are United and Continental airlines.
And, of course, you need to make arrange-
ments with American Atheists to attend.
Early registration will be just $50 per
person, or $25 for students and
elderly on a fixed income (I.D.
required). But after March 27,
1987, registration will be $60
per person ($30 for students
and elderly on a fixed income).
Send your registration to:
1987
~m eric an Ath eists
Convent ion
D env er, C O
November 1986
Convention Coordinator
American Atheist Center
P.O. Box 2117
Austin, TX 78768-2117
(Make checksor money orders for
the registration fee payable to
American Atheist Convention.
Visa and Mastercardaccepted.)
American Atheist
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ASK A A
In Letters to the Editor, readers
give their opinions, ideas, and informa-
tion. But in Ask A.A.,
American
Athe-
ists answers questions regarding its
policies, positions, and
customs, as
well
as queries
of factual and historical
situations.
The end of the tax year iscoming up, and I
am thinking about ways to pay less tax.
Could you please clarify what payments,
etc., to American Atheists are tax-deduct-
ible?
Shannon Gumps
Texas
(1 ) All levels of membership inAmerican
Atheists are tax-deductible. Membership
fees are structured
so
that almost anyone
can afford them. (Those who are absolutely
unable to meet a membership fee are finan-
cially assisted.) Fees range from $12 a year
for Student to $750 for Couple Life. These
can be utilized by members to help them-
selves on the tax problem: Better to pay
$100 Sustaining membership fee each year
than to give it to the tax collector. Ifyou are
retired and have money, better to take the
regular membership of $40 a year and
deduct that on your 1040 than to take the
$20 Senior Citizen/Unemployed (65+/re-
stricted income) membership.
(2) All monetary donations to American
Atheists are tax-deductible. ,
(3 )A Sustaining subscription to the Amer-
ican Atheist
($50
a
year) is tax-deductible.
(4 ) A regular subscription to the Ameri-
can Atheist magazine isnot tax-deductible.
(5) Purchases of books and other
prod-
ucts from American Atheists are not tax-
deductible.
Religionoften sells books using a gimmick
that allows the buyer to take the cost of the
books off their taxes as a donation to a
charity. The television viewer is told that a
certain religious book, magazine, or other
article is free, but at the same time is
invited to send in a donation (tax-deduct-
ible) for the book, magazine, or whatever.
This is a very clever way of getting books
tax-exempted. Why can't American Athe-
ists use a similar gimmick? Iwould rather use
the money I save on taxes to buy more
books from American Atheists or give it
back to American Atheists as a donation.
American Atheists has stated several times
that books are not tax-deductible, and only
Austin, Texas
membership fees are. Why doesn't Ameri-
can Atheists use the same gimmick religion
uses to give its members a tax break? Ifyou
think there will be problems with the reli-
gious ordering books and not paying, why
not restrict the tax exemption for books to
members only?
Dan Chilinski
Ohio
You hit the nail
on
the head. The above
method of book sale issimply dishonest and
is used almost exclusively by the most dis-
honest groups in the nation - the religious.
We do not care to emulate them, simply
because itis
a
measure of deceit. The intent
is not to sell a book; the intent is to get the
donation by advertising deceit. The books
are printed by mass methods so that the per
unit cost is insignificant
to
the church which
is offering it as bait. The sucker is then on
the church mailing list for further hits
which do not include giveaways. The banks
did this at one time, if you remember; the
green stamp method of sale inmany gro-
cery stores was of the same nature.
American
Atheists does not desire to fig-
ure out dishonest schemes of tax evasion.
Currently, we are givingaway books (and it
hurts) for
a prompt
return of magazine
resubscription and renewal of membership.
This isnot at all widely advertised. We need
the money so damn bad that we are willing
to stand on our heads to get it. Now, if we
could only sellyou heaven, we would never
need to deliver, and my gawd how the
money would roll in.
You state that dues are tax-deductible
and that single subscriptions to the maga-
zine are not. This is understandable. How-
ever, IRS regulations state that anything of
value received with a donation must be
deducted from the claimed tax deduction
(booklet, theater admission, etc.).
Is the magazine coming with the dues
considered to be a thing of value to be
deducted before claiming the tax deduction?
Or, on the other hand, isthe fullamount paid
considered dues and tax deductible even
though the magazine is received as a result
of paying this amount?
I should appreciate your prompt reply as
tax deadline is fast approaching.
Ifthe magazine must be deducted, please
let me know how much.
Elmont Tunison
New Jersey
November 1986
What we are talking about here is not
even applicable to most people. The IRS
permits you to automatically take a deduc-
tion of
2
percent, regardless of your income,
assuming that is how much people give to
charitable and nonprofit organizations. You
do not need to itemize this 2 percent, but
you must keep proof of donation. Assuming
that a family of four is living at the poverty
level, which isabout $23,000 these days, the
IRS assumes that you have given 460 to
organizations like
American
Atheists, which
is 2 percent ifyou are at this $23,000 level.
Most cause organizations inthe United
States receive $100or more annually from 1
percent of their constituency. The other 99
percent contribute less.
If you are a senior citizen with a limited
income, your annual membership dues are
$20;for students, annual dues are only $12.
So
the IRS permits you to deduct it all
on
a
1040-A (short form) ifyour annual income is
over $1,000 a year. Full-time students don't
have any income tax deducted up to a cer-
tain amount, but can deduct the $12 if their
taxable income exceeds 640a year. Before
you can begin to itemize deductions, you
have to have deductions of over $2,000 a
year, excluding your own personal exemp-
tion. Most taxpayers do not make enough,
or have enough allowable deductions, to
worry.
The magazine
is an
incident of member-
ship, and we place no dollar value on itfor
fillingthat function. Actually, we lose money
on
every magazine that goes out of The
Center. The cost of printing is about 3per
magazine if one does not figure any of the
general overhead costs of The American
Atheist Center into production.
The magazine subscription alone is $25
per year, which does NOT cover the cost of
production and mailing, as indicated above.
American Atheists is a nonprofit, nonpoliti-
cal, educational organization, and itsimply
absorbs the cost of educating and informing
Atheists. Those who actually assist us get a
tax break as - for example - a Sustaining
subscription for $50 a year, which may be
deducted as a donation also.
The revisions in the IRS regulations for
1986 now allow you to deduct
up
to
50 per-
cent of your income for cause and charita-
ble organizations, prorated for your tax
bracket. This is general advice which
ap-
plies to most people. Ifyour income and tax
situation is unusual, or if you have excep-
tionally complex tax preparation, consult
your CPA or attorney.
Page 7
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10/48
MADALYN O'HAIR
PLOTTING ATHEIST .FUNERALS
IIWhat do we - Atheists - do with the
body? Bury it, burn it, or sink it, of course.
But is there any single answer to
t
problem of what or what not to say over it?
Page 8
November 1986
American Atheist
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THE BELL'S FINAL TOLL
Barbara Marion Sinclair
So fleeting is a lifetime
And so full of sunshine -
When it chooses not to rain;
Scarcely are we born
Only to shed this mortal coil.
What precious moments we are not suffering
We spend in frenzied quest for pleasure;
As though lifewere a gag:
Tempting us ... abandoning us ...
Like a fleeting furlough.
Hardly is the fog of youth lifted
Before becoming the burden of maturity
That suppresses yet defines us:
Grains of sand upon the beach of humanity.
This case was brought to a hearing in the
United States Supreme Court in April 1856
and was confirmed. The Ruggles report thus
came then to form the basis for funeral and
burial law in the United States. quite apart
from English precedence.
Legal interest in the corpse came to be
accepted as inhering in the next ofkin, being
the duty and right of prescribing ceremony
and disposing of the body. The rights have
developed to be those of (1) holding and
protecting the body until it is processed for
disposal, (2) selecting the place and manner
------------------------------- ••.•• of the disposition, (3) prescribing the last rite
ceremonies, and (4) carrying out the disposi-
tion by placing the body in a grave, crypt,
niche, or urn, or in a crematorium. These
rights are protected by law, and the courts
may intervene by injunctions, or award
monetary damages for interference with
them.
Legal writings attempting to enlarge on
these rights for the benefit of better under-
standing have stated that the burial should
comport with the prevailing sense ofdecency
inthe community and that itwould be nice to
permit the wishes of the dead person to be
taken into account. There are long strings of
priorities of who does what when kith and
kin are at one another's throats over what to
do, and a number of cases developed into
legal brawls over what religious services
should rule, primarily when a next of kin was
ofa different brand than the deceased. Ifno
next of kin is found, the duty for disposal of
the body falls on community officials.
In any event, what is done must be done
with all deliberate speed, and many states
have written into their Health Codes that
one can be charged with a misdemeanor if
there is not a disposition of the body in a
reasonable time. The fact of decomposi-
tion of the dead body is and has always been
everywhere present.
4
Also, ifdeath is caused
by infectious, communicable, or loathsome
disease, the states often impose special pre-
cautions on body preparation as well as
We carry with us little more
Than the savage scars
Of a drunk and arrogant yesterday;
And the fretful futile scandals of last night.
And now, like a vacant gallows,
An idle wind punctuates
The lifethat was my eternity.
is no longer even a person, with a singular
personality which sets him or her apart.
There is simply a body, and all dead bodies
present identical problems: What do we do
with them? At the moment of death, all
responsibility for the rights of the dead per-
son are dictated by the laws of whatever
nation inwhich he or she dies. Most st~tes in
our union have or are making more clearly
defined legal definitions of death. The dec-
laration ofSydney, Australia, by the Twenty-
Second World Medical Assembly inAugust
1968, stated: Death is a gradual process at
the cellular levelwith tissues varying in their
ability to withstand deprivation of oxygen
supply. But medicine is one discipline and
law is another. Death has been set forth
legally as occurring when the heart stops
beating, ,the respiration ends, and there is a
cessation of the animal and vital functions
consequent thereon. This is a very precise
time, not the continuing event that medical
science now defines. The dichotomy shows
up in our time when the law says the heart
has not died, but medical science says the
brain is dead. Heroic survival techniques to
keep the popularly named vegetable
existence, as with Karen Quinlan, or Baby
Doe, are vigorously debated.
Even here, the question is What do we do
with the body? Shall we keep it alive? Shall
we stop heroic efforts and dispose ofit?That
concern is not relevant here, for ultimately
Page 10
one way or another, at one time or another,
the same situation will appertain: There
must be a disposition of the body.
In the United States, with no state reli-
gion, and with an abandonment of the
Church of England during the time of our
Revolutionary War, there were few ecclesi-
astical courts to pontificate concerned with
funerals or burial rites. In England, the habit
had been to place the bodies of the dead in
consecrated grounds, usually in church-
yards or churches themselves. In the colo-
nies and later the United States, the burials
were relatively casual, with family grave-
yards or municipally controlled cemeteries.
A court fight inNew York over the remov-
al of a body from one place of interment to
another (when a street in Lower Manhattan
needed to be widened) resulted ina study of
dead bodies and burials. This was written by
the court referee, the Hon. Samuel B. Rug-
gles, and was printed in Bradford's Surro-
gate Reports (vql. 4).2 The conclusions
reached in this report were later set forth in
the case of Bogert v. City of lndi anapolis i
1.That neither a corpse, nor its bur-
ial, is legally subject, in any way, to
2Appendix, p. 503 (1856)
313Ind. 134 (1859)
November 1986
ecclesiastical cognizance, nor to sac-
erdotal power of any kind.
2. That the right to bury a corpse
and to preserve its remains, is a legal
right, which the courts of law willrec-
ognize and protect.
3. Thatsuch right, in the absence of
any testamentary disposition, belongs
exclusively to the next of kin.
4. That the right to protect the
remains includes the right to preserve
them by separate burial, to select the
place of sepulture, and to change it at
pleasure.
5.That ifthe place ofburial be taken
for public use, the next of kin may
claim to be indemnified for the ex-
pense of removing and suitably rein-
terring the remains.
American Atheist
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hermetical sealing of any body encasement.
The opening of the West and the Civil
War have both been factors which have
changed the mode ofbody preparation. The
smaller nations of Europe did not have the
difficulty of transportation of a dead body
over long stretches of land as remains
were shipped back to the place of origin.
This led to the widespread use of embalm-
ing
5
in our country. Whereas the undertak-
ing business had been a small sideline to
cabinetmaking and carpentry enterprises, it
quickly developed into an independent, and
lucrative, business. These were all quickly
brought under some state supervision
through the process of licensing for this
work. Later, a National Funeral Directors
Association was formed and, after much
criticism of the industry inthe 1960s, both a
Code ofEthics and a Code ofGood Prac-
tice were developed. However, much scan-
dal still attaches to prearranged planning,
since unscrupulous practices have devel-
oped, most notably with the
diversion
of
money. collected to other ambitions of the
promoters.
As medical science becomes more and
more adept at using the still intact and
healthy spare parts of those who have died
to assist those in need of such organs, laws ----------------------------------
become necessary to facilitate this, lest the
culture return to the ancient practice of
grave robbing. The practice, designated as
an ante marten tissue gift,was already much
in use in July 1968 when the Uniform Ana-
tomical Gift Act (UAG.A.) was approved
by the National Conference on Uniform
Laws and by the American Bar Association.
Allfifty states and the District of Columbia
adopted the UAGA by the end of 1971.
This brought a partial end to the question
What do we do with the body? for at least
some of it could be recycled for use by oth-
ers still living.
6
But what if one decides that the entire
body should be given to a university for
study by students of medicine? The human
body
provides
excellent raw material for the
empirical teaching methods used. Actually,
each student needs about three bodies on
which to practice during his year-and-a-half
courses insurgery and anatomy. Parts, ifnot
all, of the body as dissected simply are
trashed. But the residual that is left, unfor-
4InArizona, a body may not be kept more
than forty-eight hours after death unless itis
embalmed or stored at below thirty-two
degrees Fahrenheit.
5The veins are drained of blood, and chemi-
cals designed to disinfect and preserve the
body are injected. Orthodox Jews forbid
embalming.
6A sample Uniform Donor Card is given
on page 15.
Austin, Texas
tunately, American Atheists has recently
discovered can be subject to a funeral in
which nondenominational religious mum-
bo jumbo is carried out by the chaplain
associated with the medical school. Most
frequently unclaimed bodies, those who die
at charitable institutions or in hospitals, are
used for this work.
At the beginning of our nation, Justice
Joseph Storey, together with Simon Green-
leaf, published a report on the principles of
the common law inwhich they reviewed the
offense of concealing, indecently exposing,
throwing away, or abandoning a human
body:
The proper method for disposal of
the dead has been regulated by law
from earliest times, on the continent
of Europe by the canon law, and in
England by the ecclesiastical law ...
I n
Reg. v. Stewart, the rule is
broadly laid down in the followinglan-
guage: We have no doubt, therefore,
that the common law casts on some
one the duty of carrying to the
grave,
decently covered, the dead body of
any person dying in such a state of
indigence as to leave no funds for that
purpose. The feelings and the interest
of the living require this, and create
the duty:
. . . any disposal of a dead body
which iscontrary to common decency
is an offense at common law.
What do we do with the body? Appar-
ently, we must take into account the sensi-
tivities
of the
survivors
and the general
mores of the community in which the
deceased
lived.
By 1938, in State v. Bradbury,7 a court
gave approval to cremation, distinguishing
between decent and indecent cremation. I n
the case, in the smalleastern cityof Saco, an
aged brother had, when he found his sister
dead, tied a rope around her legs, dragged
her body down the cellar stairs, shoved it
into the furnace, and burned it. It was
impossible to get it all into the firebox at
once, but once the head and shoulders were
consumed by the fire, he forced the body
79A2d A. 657 (1938).
•. , know where I'm going to spend
etemitq;
in t he
qroundl
November 1986
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farther in, and as more burned, he forced it
infarther until he was able to close the door.
He was charged with indecently disposing
ofthe body ofhis sister by burning the same
in said furnace, to the great indecency of
Christian burial, inevilexample to allothers
in like case offending .... The judge used
the criterion, The first requirement of a
sound body of law is, that it would corre-
spond with the actual feelings and demands
ofthe community, whether right or wrong.
What do we do with the body? Make damn
certain that whatever it is, the neighbors
approve.
And that isexactly what an internationally
famous Atheist couple did not do in the late
part of the nineteenth century. Elizabeth
Ney, originally ofWestphalia, Germany, and
her husband, Edmund Montgomery, M.D.,
an Atheist philosopher, were livingon their
plantation, Liendo, near Hempstead, Tex-
as, when their infant son Arti died of diph-
theria in 1873. They simply placed a stack of
logs in the center of the grove of oak trees
near their home, wrapped the small body
with cloth, saturated it with oil, placed it on
the firewood, and set it all afire. There was
no funeral service, no ceremony ofany kind.
When the fireburned out, they collected the
ashes into a leather pouch. No one knows
anything further.
Individual Opinions
As the founder of American Atheists,
members and other Atheists look to me to
develop a policy, a custom, or a rite which
can be used as a standardization for Atheist
funerals. But I don't know any more than
anyone else knows. I've never been dead. I
have, however, survived the deaths ofother
persons. And, in the course of sixty-seven
years oflivingI have attended about a dozen
and a half funerals. The most recent one was
during the writing of this article when it
became necessary to interrupt it in order to
attend a Roman Catholic funeral and a burial
ina military cemetery inSan Antonio, Texas.
The funeral mass was so generic that itcould
have been recited over the dead body of a
dog, as well as a human. There was nothing
to personalize it at all.
It should be apparent that if a decision is
made to have a ceremony, rite, wake, or
memorial concerned with the body ofsome-
one between the time of death and the dis-
A DEATH SONG
The following is reprinted from the
August
14,1886,
Truth
Seeker.
Dr. W. A. Barry died May 24th, at Jones-
town, Pa. He served as surgeon in the late
war, and was with General Sheridan in his
famous ride to the front. A delegation of
twelve physicians and insurance men ac-
companied the remains to Reading, Pa.,
where the interment took place May 27th.
The only service was the reading of the fol-
lowing poem, written by John L. Stoddard,
and by Dr. Barry's request read at the grave:
When o'er my cold and lifelessclay
The parting words of love are said,
And friends and kindred meet to pay
Their last fond tribute to the dead,
Let no stern priest, with solemn
drone,
A funeral liturgy intone,
Whose creed is foreign to my
own.
Let not a word be whispered there
In pity for my unbelief,
Or sorrow that I could not share
The viewthat gave their souls relief.
My faith to me is no less dear -
No less convincing and sincere
Than theirs, so rigid and austere.
Let no stale words of church-born
Page 12
song
Float out upon the silent air,
To prove by implication wrong
The soul of him then lying there.
Why should such words be glibly
sung
O'er one when from his living
tongue
Such empty phrases never rung?
But, rather, let the faithful few
Whose hearts are knit so close to
mine,
That they with time the dearer grew,
Assemble at the day's decline;
And while the golden sunbeams
fall
In floods of light upon my pall,
Let them in softened tones recall
Some tender memory of the dead -
Some virtuous act, some words of
power,
Which I, perchance, have done or
said,
By loved ones treasured to that
hour;
Recount the deeds which I ad-
mired,
The motive which my soul in-
spired,
The hope by which my heart was
fired.
November 1986
posal of the body that itshould be recogniz-
able as related to the person and his or her
life. For this reason, why should the same
babbling be recited over everyone? If we
have half a dozen poems from which to
choose, that won't help, for certainly there
are more than halfa dozen life-styles among
Atheists who are usually wildlyindependent
and individualistic. What mournful dirges
should we designate as music? Iwillnot stip-
ulate any. I refuse to put words into your
mouths, rhythms into your ears. Suppose he
who died, in his life, was an insufferable,
chauvinistic, selfish, brutal, sadistic man -
albeit an Atheist. Should we feign what we
feel not? Suppose another had been warm,
supportive, kind, understanding? Ifwe truly
loved him, need we flaunt this openly for all
to come into our private circle of intimacy?
At the Roman Catholic funeral which I
attended in late September, there was so
little reference to the man who had died that
no one would have recognized him. It simply
appears to me that we should at least say
something of this genre, ifwe say anything at
all:
We, relatives and friends of Ignatius
T. Wigglesby, gathered here, have
come together to commiserate one
with the other, that he has died and
that the bonds we knew exist no
more.
Ignatius T. Wigglesby - we all
called him Wiggie - with a name like
Ignatius, you know no one was going
to call him that. Well, he was born in
McComb, Mississippi, in 1932, and he
has died now, here inHouston, Texas,
this week. That means he was fifty-
four years old when he was killed in
this motor collision. We all knew him
only since he lived in our town -
about twenty years now. Marcie, here,
is hissecond wifeand Jim and Bob are
his two kids. Wiggie used to hammer
on Marcie and the kids pretty regu-
larly, and we all know about that.
(Pause) One or the other of us has
always had to come to the rescue or
put the kids up for the night - some-
times even Marcie.
He was a decent man, though,
when you add it all up. He worked as
best he could, and he was a good elec-
tronics engineer. He put himself
through the University of Texas, and
he always supported Marcie and the
kids. Marcie always was going back to
him, even with those lumps she took
- so he had something to offer.
He sure loved football, didn't he?
He had a bet with me on the Oilers for
next week.
None of us really knows if Wiggie
got out of lifewhat he wanted to get.
He took some awful pride inhaving his
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house and fixingit up all the time, like
he did. Everybody liked him on the job
- he was a twenty-year man at
General Electrics here. He did his
work well. He was skilled and com-
petent.
(A small chuckle) He sure told
some good jokes, too. He was pretty
easy to get along with - unless you
were Marcie or the kids.
But, he's dead now. Itwillbe kind of
rocky here to get used to the idea that
he's dead. But that's it. He could have
used a few more years.
The coffinis closed because he was
pretty banged up. The kid in the
pickup who hit him was sniffing glue.
He's still in jail yet. Somehow, it
doesn't allseem right, but then a lotof
lifedoesn't.
Now if you'll all just get together,
we're planning to take him out to
Wake Forest Memorial since Marcie
wanted him buried there. The two of
them have a lot there. That's about all
I can say. Thank you all for coming.
Some small recitation such as this would
be a lot more honest than anything any ofus
has ever heard at any funeral. Talking about
death, ingeneral, isnot going to help anyone
handle the grief one has, ifone has any. Or,
help one over one's feelings ofguiltifone did
not really like the deceased because he was
a mean son-of-a-bitch. Atheists should han-
dle reality even in death. We all survive
someone else's death; it's our own which
finishes the story for each of us.
What do we do with the body?
What music is to be used? Is the question
ever asked, Why music at all? W,hat if
there should be, instead, a recording played
of a football game being described by How-
ard Cosell? Why not have a primal scream
as the coffin lid closes?
How do you plan to clothe the carcass?
Where is it going? Do bodies need. to be
covered at all?Should the Judeo-Christian
obsession with the sin ofnudeness followan
Atheist also to his/her grave? Undercloth-
ing? stockings? shoes? Why not an over-
coat, earmuffs, and galoshes? One makes as
much sense as the other.
Why the dressing of the hair, and
makeup, especially with the closed coffin
idea currrently in vogue? Why not shave
under the arms then and spray on an under-
arm deodorant? Let us be as absurd as pos-
sible. Female corpses can have hair removed
from their legs with their favorite depilatory.
Should you let the tattoos show? After all,
they were put on by the former owner who
probably was quite proud of them.
What do we do with the body? Shave it,
powder it, perfume it, groom it, dress it inits
best clothes - and then put it some place,
away from our sight and our smell, to rot.
Austin, Texas
•
Hello ... Mister FriCK? I'm calling to let 40u Know that Herbert Allison
won't be at work todoq he's dead as a doornai l: '
Take it to a crematorium, dump it into a
body ofwater, bury it ina hole inthe ground.
You really don't have any other options at
this point in history.
No matter what you do, it is dumb to
spend a lot of money. Dead bodies can't see
anything, feel anything, or know anything. A
quick, inexpensive disposal is all that is
necessary. Every living person knows how
others feel toward them. There need not be
an excessive display, at the monetary
expense ofthose who remain alive, upon the
occasion of a death.
More and more members advise the
National Office of American Atheists that
they have made anatomical gifts of their
tissues, willed their bodies to medical
schools, or requested cremation. These
solutions to the problem of What do we do
with the body? would appear to be the most
rational, scientific - and Atheist. The Amer-
ican Atheist Center highlyrecommends any
of the three to you - as you plot your future
demise.
P ar t II
Actually, all any of us knows about funer-
als consists of our own personal experience
with the same. One and all, they are awash
with emotion, hardly events to be analyzed
objectively. No person can look death in the
face and come away from the experience
November 1986
without it having an effect, momentary or
permanent, slight or profound, but always
emotional.
Allof our burials today hark back to these
older practices of thousands ofyears ago -
inhumation, cremation, embalming, various
types of graves, cemeteries, preparation of
the body for burial, expressions of grief,
floral contributions, funeral processions,
funeral orations, gravestones and epitaphs,
consolatory and adulatory feasting, funeral
music. Recently I have been informed that
children are now excluded from many fu-
nerals so that they need not ,endure the
trauma. It appears to me that to exclude
children from anything puts them in a posi-
tion ofimagining what might happen; escorts
them into a world of unreality and make-
believe. Children should be privy to all
aspects of sickness, death, funeral arrange-
ments, and body disposal. This isthe stuff of
life, the duty of the living, and of death, the
lesson that there is a final end.
As I reviewed this month, my short ac-
quaintance with death and funerals, What
have I to do, I thought, with a statement
concerned with Atheists and funerals? I
know no more than anyone else. Who has a
right to pontificate, or to set down rules?
Certainly, we want to be rid of all the super-
stition, the religious trappings which have
accompanied the idea of death, but how to
do that? Ah, that's the rub.
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What do I mean by all these random thoughts?
Should there be a ceremony in my behalf? I have
thought long and hard about this. Iwould not need
one. I don't think those persons who knew me,
worked with me, or loved me would need one.
What should one do when an Atheist
dies? With alacrity, the answer comes, Bury
him. But, Idon't think that isthe immediate
answer. Paul Tirmenstein stipulated in his
will that his body should be picked up and
transported to the Anatomy Department,
University of Tennessee Medical Unit in
Memphis. Lloyd Thoren has an arrange-
ment with the University of Indiana. Ernest
Kerpen willed his to the University of
California.
A problem is that one's body belongs to
one's relative(s) when one dies. Like a piece
offurniture, an old book, a well-worn coat, it
becomes to all extents and purposes the
property of the next of kin. Most usually
Atheist bodies are buried with extravagant
religious rituals as (especially) spouses act
out long-suppressed hostilities with crosses,
Bibles, priests, hymns, ministers, churches,
holy water, communion wafers, prayers,
printed religious announcements, and rosa-
ries. The notices and descriptions received
at The American Atheist Center are some-
times nauseating. We had all thought for
forty years that Lou Alt's wifewas an Atheist
- and so did he. The affidavit inour filestells
with what delight Ida burned his Atheist
library and how religiously she buried him.
After the Anatomy' Departments in the
medical schools are done, what is leftof the
body isfrequently taken to the school chapel
where a religious service is given over the
remnants before they are buried or burned.
How can one win?
You can stipulate until your pen runs out
of ink as to what you want done with your
body when you die. Your next of kin can
ignore anything you say, can tear up any
stipulations you leave. If they do not like
your will,allthey need do issimply destroy it
and innocently tell everyone you left no will.
When you are dead, you cannot alter the
events that your death sets into motion. You
may say cremate, your next of kin can
ignore you. You may make prearrangements
with a mortuary, and your next of kin can
change them inany way.You may designate
your money is to go to your paramour, and
your wifeneeds only to tear up your will.
You can't win. When you are dead,
anyone can, really, do almost any damn
Page
14
thing he cares to do, not alone with your
property, but also with your body.
My Own Body
And then, I thought, what about me? I
represent Atheism to the world. Wouldn't
the religionists love to get their filthypaws on
my corpse? And, so I have told Jon and
Robin - no funeral parlors or mortuaries. I
don't want some religious nut to shove a
rosary up the ass of my body, or a commu-
nion wafer down its throat. My physical
body is the host of Madalyn O'Hair. Well,
that's not right. There is nothing indwelling,
no soul, no spirit, no essence, nothing. I am
simplyallofthe parts acting inconcert under
the direction ofa depository brain which has
stored both the record and the education I
received from the events of my lifeand the
genetically inherited factors, upon which I
have acted. The dead carcass is the carcass.
It should not matter ifthey shove a cross up
its ass, or spray holy water in its nose, or
screw it in the ear; when life is gone, it
doesn't matter what happens to the body.
What I don't want, as I t hink of it now, is for
the religious to get the satisfaction of corpse
mutilation or activities which would encour-
age them to assume that they have wrought
revenge for their god.
As I review what has been done with
corpses: What is the sense of draining out
blood? That isbarbaric and useless. So what
if the face of the body is up or down or
sideways, east or west? What does itmatter
if the body is flat on its back, curled on its
side, or ina fetal position? The idea ofdress-
ing up a body isbizarre. What isthe need, for
example, of pockets in a shroud? Why a
metal or plastic casket which is not biode-
gradable? Why a concrete vault? This is an
extraordinary expenditure of money for no
reason. The body should be permitted to
decompose in the earth, at minimum. The
hundreds ofthousands ofsquare miles which
have been removed from farming, building,
and park areas inorder to accommodate the
bodies ofthe dead isa scandal inour nation.
Fields of wheat should be planted there, or
- in town areas - market gardens should
be growing tomatoes, potatoes, lettuce,
November 1986
squash, cucumbers, and other vegetables. If
not food for the hungry, at least flowers and
shrubs for livingbeauty could be produced
from these fallow, neglected acres.
Everything done in funerals in our nation
today is for the preservation of the body, its
dressing, to prepare itfor that moment when
the (Christian) rapture will carry the body
heavenward to a new life. Hairstyles and
cosmetics for the dead? Manicures and
cologne? We are carrying on insane tradi-
tions. A new suit, or a new dress - often
something the person could not have af-
forded when alive? Where willthey walk in
shoes? This is a shameful waste. And why
should there be a different mourning mode
of dress for the relatives? Let us allay the
armbands, the wretched blacks of suit and
dress, the covered heads. None of this is
important. Ifone truly mourns the death of a
relative or comrade, the feeling within one
need not be posted without for the world to
see. It is too private to display.
I am appalled at the worries over who all
signs the guest book at the mortuary, count-
ing the noses of those who show up and
those who don't. The arguments as to which
automobile follows the hearse and how
many are in the funeral procession, who
rides with whom, whether to hire the mortu-
ary limousines, are indiscreet shocks to my
sensibilities. And did you see, my dear, that
skinny littlespray of flowers? Does itmatter
to the body laying there?
I have told Jon and Robin that when I die,
they should gather me up in a sheet,
unwashed, drag or carry me out and put me
on a pyre in the backyard and burn my car-
cass. Now, they can't do that; I know that.
When we visited in India, we were taken to
the outdoor crematoria of the poor. A large
number of bundles of wood are needed to
burn up a human body. The process takes
hours, the fire must be hot and constant,
and itsmells like a barbecue. There are more
ashes and cinders from the wood than from
the body, ofcourse. IfThe American Atheist
Center ever gets acreage and this can prop-
erly be done, itis stillmy preferred desire for
the disposal of my body. I know it will take
six to eight hours and someone has to tend
to the damn thing so that the fire doesn't go
out. If they can't do it themselves, then I
want them to throw the carcass in the back
of The Center's van and tote it down to San
Antonio where there isa crematorium. But I
want Jon to handle the process of loading
the carcass into the oven, himself. I don't
want any damn Christer praying over the
body or even putting his hands on it. It
served mewellfor decades and, as one takes
care of an old car that has been of service, I
want the same for my body. Again, I realize
that it real