Christianity's Celebration of Death

Today, I walked out of the local grocery store as a Christian walked in.  I could tell she was a Christian because she wore a huge blinged-out cross around her neck; you know, like the over-sized necklace bling that many hip-hop artists wear to show off their money.  Yet, this old woman wasn't showing off her bank account.  She was displaying her obsession with death.  I am reminded about how the cross is just one of the many symbols and ideas of death that are part of the Christian faith.

The cross is the symbol that epitomizes what it means to be Christian, since their savior supposedly died on one.  Christians decorate tombstones, churches, and public and private lands with it.  Many Christian officials proudly display a bloodied Jesus hanging from a cross within church walls.  Another idea of their celebration of death is the Eucharist, Holy Communion, Sacrament, or Lord's Supper, in which transubstantiation occurs.  Transubstantiation is the symbolic change from wine into blood and bread into the body of Jesus Christ.  This could be viewed as symbolic cannibalism; an unnerving deathly observance.

Some fundamentalist Christians even believe what is called The Rapture; the idea that Jesus will return a second time and believers will immediately move on to the afterlife in Heaven, while non-believers will be left behind to perish in the apocalypse.  "The majority of present-day Christians support the idea that war is regrettable but unavoidable..."  They believe wars and killing are just if it positively influences their future.  The Christian Bible also celebrates genocide.  This fascination with death and quickly entering the Christian heaven is depressing.  Many Christians incorrectly think atheists can't find a purpose for living, but since Christians obsess about death, it's curious how they can find positive fulfillment in their own life.