Tuesday, October 21, 2008

You gotta love language


Mrs. T and I spent Monday at a "Come Home Celebration".

Come Home Celebrations are new to me, but the concept is one I am far too familiar with, and likely to become only more so. For those of you not in the know, it's a funeral.

I have googled the term, searched arcane regional dictionaries, and otherwise made a nuisance of myself attempting to find the origins and derivation of this phrase and have come to naught. It must have been created recently by a theological committee with too much time and too much imagination on their hands in an attempt to get back at we non believers. I can't see this catching on.

Unless, is this an AA, or other ethnic usage? To coin a phrase, "I'm dying to know". Anyone have any ideas?

Toad








2 comments:

Mom on the Run said...

Here it's called a Homegoing service in the AA community. They list the time for the "Homegoing" in the obituary (the ones placed by family, of course).

ms. mindless said...

i am african american and i have heard of funerals referred to as "homecoming" or "homegoing" celebrations. but, i think that it also has a lot to do with the family's religion. my family is episcopalian and quite traditional, so i think my grandmother might rise up out of her coffin to smack someone if we called her funeral a "homegoing". but for a baptist or an evangelical family, that could be the norm. also, my mom has a copy of that print in our house. it was in the cosby house on the cobsy show and i know so many other AA families that have it too!