The funeral and burial of a Cistercian Monk reminds us that by acknowledging the reality of death we can more readily affirm the meaning of life.
Monks take seriously the words of Christ as recorded in the Gospel of John: "I am the Resurrection and the Life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live." (Jn 11: 25). Accordingly, monks live their lives in the conviction that when death occurs it is not something to be feared or denied. Instead, it is to be welcomed as a birth into an entirely new way of being fully and eternally alive.
The death and burial of a Cistercian monk, as recorded in the words and images that follow, reflects a harmony between the stark finality of death and the profound reality of what is taking place in a life that is just beginning. | 
