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Human Values in a Mechanistic Universe

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 January 2010

Margaret A. Boden
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Extract

The truth can be dangerous. It is because they realise this that the Roman Catholic Church forbid cremation. Cremation is, of course, theologically permissible, and in times of epidemic the Church allows it. But in normal times it is forbidden — Why? The reason is that the Church fears the influence of the image associated with it. It is difficult enough for the faithful to accept the notion of bodily resurrection after having seen a burial (knowing that the body will eventually decay in the ground). But the image of the whole body being consumed by flames and changing within a few minutes to a heap of ashes is an even more powerful apparent contradiction of the theological claim of bodily resurrection at the Day of Judgement. (Indeed, the ban on cremation was introduced when the French Freemasons held anti-Catholic demonstrations, in which they burned their dead saying ‘There, you see: they won't rise again!’) In short, instead of relying only on abstract theological argument, which very likely would not convince their flock in any case, the Church deals with this threat to faith by attacking the concrete image.

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Papers
Information
Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements , Volume 11: Human Values , March 1977 , pp. 135 - 171
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy and the contributors 1977

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References

NOTES

1 Monod, Jacques, Chance and Necessity (London: Collins, 1972).Google Scholar For Monod's defence of ‘the ethics of knowledge’ in preference to ‘animist ethics’, see chapter 9.

2 Further details are given in my Artificial Intelligence and Natural Man (Hassocks, Sussex: Harvester Press; New York: Basic Books, 1977).Google Scholar

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4 This philosophical position is discussed more fully in my Purposive Explanation in Psychology (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard U.P., 1972)Google Scholar, esp. chs. ii, iv, and viii.

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