Deathbeds, Tombs, Relics: Venerating Saints

More on my pilgrimage to Assisi.  Not only did I walk where Francis and Clare walked, I visited the rooms where they died, and their tombs.  Why are those places so special?  Also a word about Matthew Shepard and his final resting place.

When our beloveds die, we don’t want to let them go.  So we keep some of their precious possessions, like their clothes.  And we visit their grave and other special places we associate with them.

When beloved saints die, their devotees do the same thing - hold onto their precious possessions, and visit their special places.  But since the saint’s things and locations seem imbued with the power and presence they had while alive, there’s an added intensity, and many more visitors.

In Assisi it was easy and not crowded to visit places where Francis and Clare lived and worked; their homes, streets and paths and piazzas they frequented, churches where they were baptized and preached.  But we had to wait in line to see the exact locations where each of them died, simple rooms in a convent and a chapel, now enshrined.  To visit the burial crypts deep in their vast basilicas where their bodies now lie, those lines were even longer.  In both lines, all were silent.

A couple days after leaving Assisi, now in Rome, a big windy hailstorm woke me up and I couldn’t get back to sleep.  So I watched on YouTube the worship service that had taken place a few days earlier at the National Cathedral in Washington DC of the internment of Matthew Shepard’s ashes.  The solemn formal ceremony, with a moving sermon by Bishop Gene Washington, culminated in the placement, 20 years after his death, of Shepherd’s ashes in a private area in the crypt columbarium. 

Just as I have pictures in my head now of the simple rooms where Francis and Clare actually died, (and the deathbeds of other loved ones for that matter) I can never get out of my head the image of the Wyoming windswept road and barbed wire fence where Matthew Shepard was beaten and left clinging to life, killed because he was gay.  His funeral was picketed by more haters, so-called Christian ones this time.  His parents feared that his gravesite would be vandalized and desecrated, so they held on to his ashes.

But now the National Cathedral had offered such a safe place.  Shepherd had been an active church member and now he too has a sacred resting place where his loved ones and admirers can visit and honor him.  His remains are in a protected spot, closed to the public, but there will be a plaque and the knowledge that a big old beautiful building is keeping his ashes and his memory safe.

Clare and Francis’ bodies are also in big old beautiful safe buildings, in their cases basilicas built within just a few years of their deaths specifically to house their remains.  There was also some concern around the safety of their placement, especially Francis’, not so much for possible hate filled desecration, but that someone might steal his body or relics to honor (or sell) them elsewhere.  In any case, his body was hidden for centuries, only recovered 200 years ago and rehoused in a massive marble sarcophagus beneath the equally massive and ornate basilica.  I imagine Francis would have designed himself a much simple grave.  We do know he asked that his dying body be carried outside and laid on the bare earth, to close the circle of “ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” and as a reconnection to his beloved Mother Earth. 

Clare’s body is housed in her basilica inside a sort of shell sculpture of herself - you can practically see the body itself.  In the same crypt area is a moving display of the kinds of precious possessions we keep after a loved one dies – her clothes, hair, her written rule.  I’m usually sort of cynical about relics, arm bones and teeth with supposed healing power.  But these undyed robes and even the curly blond hair were moving in their personal simplicity.

I’ll keep writing here about Clare and Francis, and saints in general, for some more weeks. In previous columns I’ve expressed my ambivalence about the whole idea of saints -  are they better than other people, do they have special powers, who decides who is a saint – typical modern Protestant doubts. 

But there was something inspiring about seeing those pilgrims from all over the world lined up to honor the memories and the bodies of Francis and Clare, even to pray to them for strength and healing. 

I got a similar feeling seeing that packed National Cathedral, those folks lined up to honor Matthew Shepard and preserve his memory. 

There are all kinds of ways to honor remarkable people who live and die with some kind of special integrity.  Doing good works in their name, writing about them (!) – all good.  But it also honors them simply to stand with others in the actual presence of the precious one’s bodily remains.  Beautiful holy buildings serve many functions, but especially after seeing the National Cathedral service, I appreciate their role in keeping the bodies of holy ones safe and their memories alive.

In the Christian tradition we have just celebrated All Souls and All Saints Days.  Feels like a good time of year to honor these three holy ones, Clare, Francis, Matthew.

Copyright © 2018 Deborah Streeter