Written before the Boston bombings, here is a sobering meditation on our death-celebrating culture. The sympathetic response to the Boston attacks from traditional U.S. adversaries including Cuba, Russia, and even the Taliban, offers an interesting recent angle on Kyle’s point.
-Paul
When I first learned about the tragic suicide of Rick Warren’s son, the bottom dropped out of my stomach. Memories of a friend who had taken his own life were yanked back to the front of my mind. I remembered the anger, the sorrow, the unanswered questions, even guilt that I felt. Even though the Warrens were strangers, I grieved with them. I felt connected to them through the common experience of suffering and a common hope in the Lord. I was encouraged by the outpouring of empathy for them I saw on Twitter and Facebook, forming a network of love around the Warren family.
But I soon learned that my feelings weren’t shared by everyone. Shortly after the tragedy, Rick Warren posted this on Facebook: “Grieving is hard. Grieving as public figures, harder. Grieving while haters celebrate your pain, hardest.” I was shocked. Who could these hate-mongers be? What kind of fringe lunatics would target a man as he mourned his son? A quick web search yielded a sickening reality. Angry bloggers and commenters were using the tragedy to attack Warren’s pastoral leadership, his view of marriage, his belief in a loving God, and more. What disturbed me even more was how mainstream some of these voices were.
I was equally shocked by the commentary surrounding the death of former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher. Her time in office may have been divisive, but while some news stories focused on her legacy, a large portion of the coverage zeroed in on activists rejoicing her death. These people waved signs reading “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead,” like triumphant victors in a parade. I’ve attended a few wakes, where friends and family gather over good food and drink to share stories and memories of the deceased, all in celebration of their life. But these images of wild dancing, flowing champagne, and crazed smiles reflected something different: a celebration of death that stemmed from hatred.
Celebrating death
I find it hard to understand the psychology behind this. Reveling in the death of a human being is revolting. Surely those who take advantage of a grieving father or those who dance in the streets at the passing of a public figure aren’t representative of the average person. But I remember a recent death that was publicly celebrated by many average people in the United States.
When Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. Special Forces in 2011, videos of celebrating Americans dominated the news. When a professor exclaimed, “We got him!” in my seminary classroom, a cheer broke out. I was surprised by the unbridled excitement of many close friends. But I didn’t feel like celebrating. I couldn’t say that I hadn’t hoped for this outcome. The world felt safer without this man living in it. But I couldn’t help thinking, Is any human death, even the death of someone as despicable as bin Laden, cause for celebration?
Many would agree with me that the world is a better, safer place without someone like Osama bin Laden. But even that thought is reason to grieve, not to celebrate. How evil are the designs of Satan, how corrupting the nature of sin to take humans created in God’s image and twist them so far from his purposes—to the point that creation is better off without them? The snuffing out of God’s image, no matter how twisted it has become, is a solemn event.
Human death is so serious that in Genesis 9:6, God says to humanity’s representative, Noah, “Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind.” Whether this is prescriptive or descriptive is beside the point. We can all agree that God created humans in his image and that the loss of life is a grave affair. When someone dies, even an enemy, we should grieve for the pain it causes family members left behind. We must mourn what could have been, what should have been. We should reflect on our own lives, our contributions to God’s world, and our mortality.
Dethroning death
Death can blind us to reality. While we celebrate the death of some, we idolize others in death. Should those who disagreed with, even despised Margaret Thatcher when she was alive suddenly dismiss who she was and what she did just because she died? Of course not. That would be dishonest. But her death also should not transform her into something sub-human, a creature whose death should be celebrated. Death is one of the few experiences common to the whole human race. Even Jesus died. When death doesn’t remind us of our mortal humanity, when it is used to dehumanize a human (either to elevate them as an idol, or portray them as a monster), we should stop in our tracks and retrace our steps. Chances are, we took a few wrong turns to get us to that place.
To understand our view of death, we need only reflect on our view of life. The responses to death mentioned above reveal a utilitarian view of life. If a person lived a productive life, they should be mourned. If they lived a destructive life, their death should bring joy. On the other hand, if we idolize a person after death to the point of dismissing their humanity, we decide they’re more useful as a caricature than as a human being. And I hope the utilitarian nature of using a son’s death to attack a father is self-evident.
When we move away from a utilitarian view of life toward a realization that death is utterly humanizing, we remember that those humans who die are marred by sin and afflicted by the Fall, but still immensely valuable to God. When human value is based on God’s image, not utilitarianism, our view of death changes. If we celebrate death (any death), then life is a plague. But if we treat death (yes, any death) with solemnity and gravity, then life is proven valuable.
Perhaps by painting the deceased as targets or raising them as idols we give death more power than it actually has, setting it up in place of God. When death claims the corrupt, we praise it for its swift justice. When death transforms a mere mortal into a legendary hero, we hope that it might do the same for us. But death is neither our judge nor our friend. Justice and salvation belong solely to the Lord. Death is our mortal enemy, the consequence of rebellion against God, and it claims the righteous and unrighteous alike (Eccl. 9:2).
As I let my anger cool and looked back over the images of gleeful partiers, celebrating the death of someone they’d never met, I noticed something I hadn’t before. They didn’t look so much like Technicolor munchkins singing “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead”—they looked far more human. Behind the crazed grins, I saw a fleck of fear, something they hoped to dance away from. Something they hoped to drown in champagne. It was fear of death, fear that they would inevitably meet the same fate as this monster they abhorred.
Followers of Christ know that death has lost its potency. Christ, our victor, has defeated death (1 Cor. 15:54–55). He sapped it of its strength on the Cross. Those who celebrate death are still living in its chains. Those who’ve been freed from death’s chains celebrate life instead.
In what other ways do we give death more power than it deserves? How can we avoid celebrating death without idolizing the deceased? Is it possible to grieve for our enemies?
Kyle Rohane is editorial resident with Leadership Journal.
