蜜芽传媒

The family of Muriel McKay 鈥� kidnapped and killed 56 years ago 鈥� are offering a million pound reward for information that can help lead to the discovery of her remains.

Though Muriel died decades ago, finding her body may provide the possibility of a moment of collective ritual to enable the family to grieve their loss.

Tragic deaths which make the recovery of a body challenging - when people are killed in bombings, when hostage bodies are not returned, when planes crash as we saw in the heartbreaking scenes yesterday 鈥� there can be a sense of incompleteness.

On Monday, I was in Belfast at a wake following the death of my dear friend鈥檚 mother. The unforgettable Angela 鈥� mother of 14 , grandmother of 29, and married to Brendan for 54 years 鈥� had died two days before and, as is the way in Ireland, her home was opened to relatives and the community to say their final goodbyes and put their arms around the family at their time of deep loss.

I found it profoundly moving; devastatingly sad and unexpectedly beautiful. Not only did I witness the community 鈥榤ourning with those who mourn鈥�, as the book of Romans commands, but I was reminded that our bodies 鈥� even in death 鈥� matter.

Celtic spirituality has 鈥� as poet John O鈥橠onohue wrote 鈥� 鈥渁 refined sense of the miracle of death鈥�. For Celts, he wrote, 鈥渢he eternal world was so close to the natural world that death was not seen as a terribly destructive or threatening event鈥�.

Though there was a deep sadness during Angela鈥檚 wake, there was a kind of beauty in the strange juxtaposition of her coffin and the cups of tea and sandwiches of the mourners gathered in her living room. Bodies eat and drink, just as bodies die.

Elsewhere in the West, death is usually kept hidden; far away; out-of-sight. Technological advancement and the increasingly disembodied lives we lead push death even further away.

There鈥檚 a common misperception that Christianity is concerned only with the spiritual 鈥� the soul 鈥� the bit of us we can鈥檛 see. But theology over many centuries has highlighted we鈥檙e neither just material nor are we just spirit. The rituals the Church has honed over millennia to help us deal with the circle of life place importance on the body. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, we say; a return to the earth out of which God formed us.

Christian hope centres on Christ鈥檚 triumph over death. This isn鈥檛 to diminish the fact we鈥檒l miss the bodies we embraced, touched, held and laughed with while they were living, but it provides a glimmer of hope about what鈥檚 to come. As O鈥橠onohue wrote, Celts are comforted that they 鈥渁re going home to where no shadow, pain, or darkness can ever touch you again鈥�.

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