Dec 03 2008
Sharing in death
The Highland Avenue Church of the Brethren is truly sharing in the midst of scarcity! Especially in a city, land for graveyards is hard to come by (and even if it’s available, it may not be appropriately used as such). So the Highland Avenue CoB is sharing a beautiful garden for the classiest communal grave!
Read more by Associate Pastor and fabulous blogger Audrey deCoursey.
And more from Elgin’s Daily Herald.
What a wonderful way to really brush up against each other! Why is this so hard for many of us in the US?
When my family lived in India, we often noticed how much people touch each other. Trains are a great example:
- My father was on a train trip once, and it was standing room only. A vendor was squeezing through the crowd to sell snacks, and my dad shifted to let him by, lifting one foot in the process. After the vendor passed by, there was no room for my father to put his foot down again, and he stood on one foot for the next hour!
- The whole family was on another long trip together, and each had a fold-out-from-the-wall cot. In the middle of the night, a man we didn’t know peeked in and saw that my cot was only 1/2 full (I was 5), and started to get in bed with me! My dad woke up, saw what was happening, and he offered the man his cot and climbed in with me instead.
I don’t think there’s a clear “good” and “bad” in these cultural examples. And I don’t think there’s a clear “good” and “bad” in mainstream US culture’s tendency toward individually-wrapped living. (I wrote a poem in high school called “Our Individually-Wrapped Society” and lucky for you, I can’t find it!)
I do see a cultural movement toward further discomfort with touching each other - especially strangers. Some of this has to do with germs, and that fear has a life of its own!
Have you ever sat down on a chair and found it still warm from the person who sat there before you? I’ve heard people grumble about this, feeling somewhat disgusted by the thought of another person’s body heat entering their own bum. But, especially in December, a warm chair can be great! Why wouldn’t this feel like a gift?
I tend to be more comfortable with physical interaction with people I know, but there are also a handful of people who I do know whose touch is particularly offensive. I had a roommate, for example, whose personal hygiene habits and personality both disgusted me, and even touching things that I knew she had touched made me shudder. I don’t think I was rationally worried about germs, but somehow had dehumanized her in my mind to the point that I found her existence in my physical space disgusting. Yikes.
What are situations in which you are uncomfortable - even disgusted - by physical contact with another person?
How much does knowing a person affect your comfort with physical touch?
Touch is one of the strongest forms of communication. Nonverbal cues communicate more than words, and maybe touching is like yelling, since it’s much more intense then waving or glancing. And we can physically harm when we touch, so if someone has been harmed before, they may be more nervous about being touched. But it is also pervasive in American culture that touch is generally bad unless there is some trust and intimacy (not necessarily romantic) between two people. It might also be about physical space, and Americans–especially white American men–like to have as much space around them as possible. I’m sure part of it’s related to power as well. Either we don’t want others to have power over us, or we don’t want to exercise power over others, and touching others’ bodies can be a very real expression of power.