A Paraguayan Funeral

I arrived at the small, rusty brick house under the cover of darkness with a large, hasty group of church members, like so many troopers storming an enemy stronghold in the middle of the night. We came to visit the home straight from Wednesday night services with a dual purpose: to offer our emotional support and physical company as a sort condolence for the bereaved immediate and evangelical family; and also, by our presence, to prevent the complex mourning and death rituals of the extended Catholic family.

The main person of interest at the meeting was the recently departed, an older gentleman who had also recently joined our Anabaptist church. Following in the spiritual footsteps of his wife and daughter, he had been accepted as a full member of the church and was baptized again on his death bed only the Thursday previous. Now it was the following Wednesday night, and he was dead. I heard he had been suffering from cancer or some other ailment for some time and had come home to die in the comfort of his home.

The home did its best job in preparing itself to honor the patriarch’s death. The front room, visible from the street, had cleared itself of all furniture and in the center, elevated like some magic floating platform, was a rented sterling silver coffin holding the body of the deceased with his feet facing the road. He was wearing a comfortable new brown sweat suit and, while I don’t think his family intended this, looked like a Franciscan monk lying in repose. In the background of this mourning scene, at the head of the coffin, was a massive crucifix lit up by Las-Vegas style neon-purple lights, along with a serious-looking six-foot silver candelabra whose one light bulb three-over from the right burnt out. To the left of the coffin was a plastic wreath-sign almost as big as the room that advertised for the funeral company. A glass of holy water under the coffin was left to ward away evil spirits.

You could feel the tension in the air just as much as you could feel the warm Paraguayan night. On one side of the front lawn sat the Catholic extended family, seemingly un-welcomed from the front room of the house once the Protestants arrived. They appeared to be moping about and waiting for us all to leave, and I noticed more than once on their faces irritated expressions of mistrust and doubt. Most of the immediate family, including the widow, daughter, a son, and some grandchildren, met with the newcomers inside.

Here, dividing the two factions by only a few physical feet, loomed the immense spiritual and ideological chasm that wholly separated the evangelical and Catholic churches and cultures of Paraguay. On one side were those who had come to build an altar of candles and say rosaries and pray ancient prayers to God on behalf the departed. On the other side were those who had come to sing songs with a guitar and preach a sermon and pray an unscripted prayer for all the family members left behind. Two worlds collided at one poor Paraguayan man’s funeral. One world that wanted to say evening masses for nine days in an elaborate ceremony to rescue the departed’s soul from hot Purgatory, and the other that wanted to reach out to the community through a gesture of inviting faith in cool contemporary form.

In the end, the evangelicals seemed to win the turf war over the dead man’s house. At the request of the widow, daughter, and some friends, evangelical preachers came every night for more than a week to prevent a Catholic mass from being said. I’m not sure how the Catholics were able to finally express their grief, but I’m fairly certain the immediate family was pleased by the reaction and support shown by the evangelical church.

And as for the welfare of the dearly departed man’s soul? I can’t say for sure where he’s at or what he’s doing, but I can say for sure that he knows now better than any of the rest of us just who is right and who is wrong in this mixed-up church business. I can also say for sure, though, that he’s not going to share his secret with me or a single living soul.