When I am not on a tight schedule and I find myself in Sandy Springs, I will sometimes pull into Arlington Cemetery to visit the graves of the priests and bishops of the archdiocese. I find it easy to say a prayer for them as I make a quick visit. At least once a year, I do the same at the Marist Fathers plot in Westview Cemetery, where we are neighbors to the Sisters of Mercy and the Hawthorne Dominicans.  

Bishop Joel M. Konzen, SM

For the Marists as well as the archdiocesan clergy, there is a necrology that accompanies our daily prayers, listing those who have died on that day. That also occasions prayers on their behalf, but there is something comforting about strolling past the names and dates for so many I have known that seems to elicit vivid images of the deceased along with my prayers. 

Some Catholics—and, more expectedly, many who are not Catholic—are surprised to learn that the Catholic Church requires cremains of a deceased person to be buried rather than placed on the mantel or scattered to the sea or the wind. The church requires burial because the body, whether in a coffin or an urn, is to be respected as possessing sanctity even in death. These are, after all, the remains of one who has been baptized and who has received the other sacraments throughout a lifetime. The church teaches that our soul has departed the body at the time of death but will be reunited with a glorified body on the last day. Consequently, the church requires cremains to be kept intact, not to be separated, just as would be the case with burial of the body. 

Cremation has become a popular option for Catholics, which has given rise to parishes with a columbarium where cremains may be interred. There are some in the Atlanta area that I visit in the course of a burial or when I am at the parish for another reason. There, too, I find it easy to offer a prayer for the deceased, many of whose names are familiar to me. This is one of the main reasons that parishes are giving parishioners the option to be buried onsite, so that loved ones may visit easily and remember the deceased in their prayers. 

Not everyone is moved to visit the columbarium or cemetery. Some prefer to do their praying for the dead in the quiet of their homes or in church. Others have a hard time negotiating the uneven grounds of a cemetery. As an altar server in my childhood, I was comfortable visiting the cemetery for burials. In our small town, I was also part of the school band that marched to the cemetery each Memorial Day in order to participate in a ceremony there recalling the service members who had died. My mother and father are buried in a rural cemetery near the church where they were married. I have occasion to visit their graves from time to time. 

Respect for the dead is one of the great hallmarks of the Catholic Church, and the manner of burial expresses the truths of our faith, reminding us that we are encouraged to pray for those who have gone before us in death and offering us the hope that we will be reunited with them when we have departed this life. Whether by being on site or by honoring the deceased on the anniversary of their death, keeping them in mind and in our prayer is an act of love and respect. Sometimes a marker will be engraved with the simple request, “Pray for me.” We do well to accommodate the request.