Outpouring of emotion - Real or just show?

[Mr. Jon Donnis]

Being born into an Orthodox family, I have witnessed up close andpersonal the extreme type of emotional outpouring you only get from the extreme religious kind.

I am sure you have seen it on tv, the old women dressed in black (widows) wailing and flailing around like its the beginning of the acopalyse.

Now i understand grieving, i understand crying, but does it get to a point where this over exageration of emotion just becomes show.

I recently attended a close family members funeral, it was a very sad time.

The funeral was in Cyprus and it was very hard on all. But when they were being buried you had the two sisters and one cousin (all female) wailing and flailing around like maniacs.

Before the coffin is lowered they remove the lid, and you had these women rubbing the hands of the dead person, slapping the cheek, kissing the head and so on.

Now you can imagine how upsetting this was for the close family of the deceased person. Especially those who were brought up in England and for all purposes are English.

Eventualy one woman had to be dragged away from the body by a family member after the deceased persons daughter screamed at her.

And I wont go into the chaos that was in the church beforehand.

So what is this outpouring, where does it come from, is it real? And why does it seem to only happen in the Christian faiths?

[pcdunn2005]

I think that's a cultural thing, not a religious one. I've read that Mediterranan and Middle Eastern cultures display grief much more openly than Western European and North American cultures do. It's not really the religion, I'd say, if your Greek Orthodox relations behave like the bereaved Muslims (and Jews) we've seen on the TV news.

At my mother's burial and few years ago, we all stood around like lumps. I cried my eyes out in the hotel room later, but not a sob at the actual graveside. (My religious background is Roman Catholic, for what it's worth).

Africans and Affrican-Americans are said to give into this sort of grief and religous ecstasy, whether practicing voudoun or Southern Baptist Christianity. Again, a cultural thing, I'm sure.

As to is it geniune-- does it matter? I do think that something happens in a large group of people all focused on a single belief, as I've sometimes experienced it, but that may be psychological, not faith-based.

[mamagpi]

I dont think its a religious thing personally, i believe it is the way famillies are used to handling grieve and the way children have been brought up watching this....For example some famillies believe once the person has died, that's it, shed your tear at the funeral and then get on with it..with my family and the Irish connections..it is almost party time...you are allowed to grieve, do your crying, then after the funeral, its food all round, plenty to drink and we celebrate the persons life, and if some one breaks into tears in all of this they are left to get on with it and no one thinks any less of them. so no i dont think religion has any thing to do with it, just the way different famillies handle things.

Did I make any sense at all with that post ?

[Mr. Jon Donnis]

The Greeks are like that too, after the funeral we party too, its just at the funeral SOB SOB SOB

[mia]

I totally understand what Jon is saying, being Greek Orthodox myself......what winds me up is in my experience some of the people who wail arent even close family or friends!

It can be really disturbing and distressing.......

I hate that they remove the coffin lid, its awful.

[mook]

I think its good to show emotion no matter what kind it is, there is nothing worse that being really upset and being embarrased to show it.

[mia]

Yea, i agree with you mook......but there are some who act like its a competition who can wail the most and the loudest.

[Mr. Jon Donnis]

mia said:

I totally understand what Jon is saying, being Greek Orthodox myself......what winds me up is in my experience some of the people who wail arent even close family or friends!

It can be really disturbing and distressing.......

I hate that they remove the coffin lid, its awful.

It can be very distressing
I remember my first experience of a Greek funeral, no one told me what would happen.
It shocked and upset me.
I was only 16 at the time too.

The wailing does at times seem competitive.

But its the touching of the dead, the feeling of the hands and face and so on.

its almost like the people doing it are trying to show they are not scared of the dead.

[lowrider]

English,stiff upper lip,the occasional gasp if you must and stifled sob into a hankie,the tea and crap sandwiches then to the pub to get mortal.
All acts that i feel would appears just as strange to other cultures.
I often feel it is what is expected of you that drives your responses.
But i am of the stiff upper lip school myself.
Not saying that is the way but i will do my grieving in private.
Last year a mate and fellow biker lost his wife in only a few weeks to undiagnosed cancer.
It was a biker funeral and i was one of the blockers that stop the traffic to allow the procession passage.
I felt that as i stood next to my bike in the middle of a wet,rainy cold road watching the procession of bikes stream on to the main road behind the hearse that we couldn't have honored Linda better that any gnashing and wailing.
Each to their own though.

[claire]

lowrider said:

English,stiff upper lip,the occasional gasp if you must and stifled sob into a hankie,the tea and crap sandwiches then to the pub to get mortal.
.

Sounds like every family funeral ive ever been too

[antmania]

When my granddad died from his second stroke, I cried, but not for myself rather for my Gran and my Mum who would feel the loss much more than myself.

I knew my grandad and knew that had he woken from the coma he found himself in, he would not have wanted to live on with the pain and paralysis so I was glad to see him slip away for that reason alone.
I believe though that funerals themselves should not be a sad occasion.They are supposed to be a celebration of someones life.The facts and circumstances surrounding thier deaths are irrelevant, It is about remembering their life and what it meant to you.
I will hate to think people are all grief stricken come my time.

[skeptomatic]

Wasn't it the custom to hire mourners in some cultures?

I can understand why you would find the outpouring of emotion upsetting Jon, but I guess that's how some people deal with it. They've probably got more chance of getting over it and moving on if they let it all hang out.

I've always found it embarrassing to cry in front of others. The stiff-upper-lip mentality is responsible for a lot of hidden pain I think.

[lowrider]

skeptomatic said:

Wasn't it the custom to hire mourners in some cultures?

I can understand why you would find the outpouring of emotion upsetting Jon, but I guess that's how some people deal with it. They've probably got more chance of getting over it and moving on if they let it all hang out.

I've always found it embarrassing to cry in front of others. The stiff-upper-lip mentality is responsible for a lot of hidden pain I think.

I do recall Eddie Izzard doing a brilliant sketch on professional mourners.
Hilarious. ;D
But i agree on being to upper lip.
I suppose some where in between would be the ideal but it is such an personal and instinctive process i think it would be hard to change.

[claire]

i know what you mean antmania, my grandad died from a second stroke and i was glad he was at peace, and i loved him more than anyone i have ever known, he was my grandad my dad my best mate and the best card player in the world, but i couldnt bear to see him reduced to a shell, which was what he was towards the end and when i cried it was for my nan (they were married 53 years) and my mum and aunts who did the majority of the caring for him. I cry more now than i did then, and its nearly twelve years ago, all i did at the time was say thank you alot to him in my head because he gave me so much, and he managed to hold on long enough to meet my son who was a few months old when he died. And i think the thank yous i said then and the crying i do now is a fitting tribute going off for a cry now

[gilgamesh]

I too come from a Irish catholic family although I haven't practised that religion since I was a child, I think the whole ritual involved is designed to aid the grieving process, and remove the fear of death and mystery from the attending mourners. The original funeral cutstoms of most cultures have been sanitised to the point that no-one really knows what to do with themselves or what the etiquette is anymore.
I went to my first viewing, funeral and wake in Ireland when I was six and was quite touched even at that age at the tenderness and respect that was shown to the deceased, the way the coffin was kept open at home for the family to attend to them and welcome friends and family to do the same before the mass..I fell to bits at my grandparents funerals and felt no shame at doing so, although the priest didn't seem to appreciate it. The organisers of funerals i.e the directors, officiates etc. seem to take too much control these days and other than choosing music and readings (if deemed appropriate, of course) the families have little say in how they want to grieve..the emphasis is on that very dignified English thing, rememberance.