Funeral cake
This is from the New York Times: SPECIAL occasions of every sort feature food and funerals are no exception. In many cultures, there are foods that are customarily served after a funeral. The funeral cakes that were traditional in some denominations in this country, mostly Protestant, were often meant not only to provide refreshment […]
Quote of the day
When we walked into the funeral home, there was my mother laid out in a pretty blue dress with townspeople milling around, smiling, greeting me, speaking of old times. Happy talk. My wife, ashen, asked, “Why is she wearing glasses?” Michael Pulley Source
Advertising Jesus
We’re always struck here at the GFG by the vilification which the unchurched can heap upon those in holy orders. It never seems to happen the other way round. Almost all secular funerals are notably inclusive and hospitable towards believers. Now that we are living in a multifaith society where any funeral audience is likely […]
Do it yourself
“Someone will wash the body. Someone will dress the body. Someone will close the eyes for the final time. Someone will. At the critical moment of death, someone will perform these tasks for the person whom we have loved and cared for all our lives. Why would we give those meaningful rituals away to a […]
Quote of the day
“Taking a deep look at my own death I began to envisage how exactly I would like my death to be. It made me realise that what I am leading my clients through in the hospice is definitely not what I would want myself and I see now that I must take a new look […]
The case for a secular funeral ritual
Though secular people are increasingly saying no to a religious funeral, we note that it’s taking them forever to do it. Why so? Because, though they reject the theology, they like the ritual. Ritual is the antidote to chaos. It brings order. Everyone knows what to do. When death turns our life upside down, convention conquers […]
Fair dos for Henry Scott Holland
Posted by our religious correspondent Richard Rawlinson In this initial blog, Fr Tim Finnigan explains his irritation with this famous reflection on death by the Anglican Canon Henry Scott-Holland (1847-1918): “Death is nothing at all. It does not count. I have only slipped away into the next room. Nothing has happened. Everything remains exactly as […]
Though rain berated the street
An Taoiseach Enda Kenny carries the coffin of his mother Eithne from the Church of the Holy Rosary in Castlebar yesterday, assisted by his brothers John and Henry and his nephew, Henry Jnr. THEY came in their thousands to pay respect to her loved ones, and though rain berated the street outside all morning long, […]
Wants out
Since a stroke six years ago Tony Nicklinson’s life has been, in his own words, ‘dull, miserable, demeaning, undignified and intolerable’. Tony can only move his head and his eyes. He has locked-in syndrome. And now he wants to die. In fact, he’s demanding the same right to end his life that any able-bodied person has. But […]
Sal-ute
Yesterday’s funeral of mafia aristo Salvatore ‘Sal the Ironworker’ Montagna was notable for the thinness of the attendance — in contrast to the hundreds who turned up to say farewell to Nicolo Rizzuto Sr in November last year. Montagna was shot last Thursday as he left a house on Ile Vaudry. Mortally wounded, leapt into […]
