Funeral Home TV Screen

On my way into work there’s always some sort of gluing together of thoughts such as: work tasks lists, who to respond to in my inbox, what project to prioritize, etc.

If I get far enough into these thoughts on my short commute, it might progress to advanced thoughts like: am I making an impact, what initiative am I currently working on is moving the needle for someone else, will people utilize my efforts today for good or evil?!

Yet without fail as I draw closer to work, the funeral home I pass by daily will have another new person on their TV screen.

It’s truly a wonderful thing the funeral home decided to do. Publicly showing those among us who are no longer with us. They’ve passed on but they were not anonymous. Here is a picture of them. Here’s their name. Here’s the born and died dates.

I’m on my way to work seeing these faces all the time. Suddenly, if I am really paying attention, I start pondering about this person.

(The road is 30 mph by the way, for anyone reading this and thinking I am about to cause more funeral home customers.)

In Andy Crouch’s book The Life We’re Looking For, he has a section called The Paradox of Personhood. Here he lists three truths about persons.

The first is there is a difference between something and someone (he lifts from a German philosopher named Robert Spacemann). Third, Andy states persons have the ability to develop, which creates his paradox because we simply are someone without having to do anything, but we have the capacity to grow and develop with the personhood we’ve been given.

For those who I caught their attentions by skipping the second, you can now calm down.

Jumping backwards to the second element of personhood Andy defines, I find why the funeral home TV screen is as effective as it is. He states,

So, while nothing can truly take away our personhood, only another person can fully give it to us. This is the second essential truth. It is when another person’s face and voice recognize us, not for what we can offer them (exploitation) but for what we intrinsically are (contemplation), that we know who we are…Only when we know and are known by others can we become fully ourselves. (P 29).

The Life We’re Looking For, P 29

Seeing the face of someone on a funeral home TV screen I never knew and can’t have the opportunity any more to do so, (to look at them, to speak to them, and in both hopefully choose to provide value, encouragement, authentication, acknowledgment)……….my work lists are trivialized and put in their proper place.

I can look at the faces of the deceased on a TV screen but there is nothing they can do for me. I am forced to just acknowledge who they are (were).

Facial expressions and hearing others speak to us in this age of digital distraction is nothing short of gold at this stage. Because this is what downloads into our personhood, giving us dignity, and moving towards development into the people we are becoming.

What’s worth more of my attention? What’s worth getting distracted in the right direction towards? Work accomplishment lists?

At these funerals, the eulogies aren’t consisting of cold lists of things these folks accomplished or did. We’re not hoping for a run down of how many merit badges they acquired.

The best eulogies, the ones we should be aiming for ourselves, are the ones where the deceased are described for who they loved. How they loved the people in their lives. The impacts they had on those who spent time with them. The untold stories of volunteerism in the background.

At this point my work to do list disintegrates. The funeral home TV screen worked once again.

It’s the people. It’s who I am impacting, who I am speaking value into daily, wherever and whenever which is the work to be done.

To look directly into people’s faces and speak only of who they intrinsically are.