Last week one of my fellow saints died. He was at a 'good' age, but, of course, death is always...always more than sad (John 11:35).
The parish funeral notice told us that he had 'gone home'.
No.
Language is always a challenge, but I think we must oppose the anonymizing neoplatonistic shorthand of 'going home'.
'presence of our Lord' would be a more direct and focused expression rather than the vague ambiguity of 'going home' which is not congruent with the Biblical data. In fact I think it tends to obscure the teaching of scripture and entertains an almost Gnostic deprecation of the created cosmos.
Thus, my quick stab at a substitute expression:
"We trust that our brother/sister having departed this life is in the presence of our Lord, with whom he/she and all the saints departed will come at his return with renewed bodies to his New Creation."
