Ken West thinks the seaside memorial bench a peculiarly English thing. Is it? The GFG simply doesn’t get out enough to know. Do our continental friends and neighbours commemorate their LOs in this way?
Ken also observes that seaside promenades are becoming very popular for the strewing of mortal cremains — often so thickly it take weeks for them to disappear.
Views?
Susan Morris is no stranger to putting herself out for others. She is Trustee, Company Secretary and mainstay of the Natural Death Centre; an award-winning palliative care nurse; and, as you can see, an Olympic Volunteer. As you may imagine, she’s also terrifically nice — and, as her photo attests, she looks great in pink, a notoriously difficult thing to pull off. It makes a change from black, she tells us.
Susan is presently to be found at Kings Cross, St Pancras and Euston train stations giving advice about travel and talking up the allure of Camden.
Susan wonders if anyone else from Funeralworld is involved with the Olympics in any way? If you are, do write or phone and tell us what you are doing.
Is there an Official Undertaker for the games? There must be. If you know who it is, please leak the information in strictest confidence.
Posted by Richard Rawlinson
This seems a strange question just after economically-challenged Britain has hosted the Olympics, a no-expenses-spared ceremonial games that unites nations in celebration of sporting prowess.
But as the cult of individuality nibbles away at established social conventions, more and more people seem to be caring less for ceremony on a more intimate level. It didn’t seem particularly surprising when a woman of my acquaintance announced on facebook she’d just had a quickie marriage in a register office, adding friends would be invited to a bash some months after the honeymoon. I’ve also attended a memorial drinks party several weeks after a no-frills committal to which only family were invited to the crematorium. As we tucked into canapes, the only significance of the occasion was that we all knew the reason for being there, and our conversation reflected this fact.
Even those who opt for ceremony can sometimes offer reasons other than a deep emotional or spiritual need to mark a profound rite of passage. Some admit to getting little satisfaction out of the ceremony itself, saying it’s just the bourgeois thing to do—and a means to the end of gathering people together for that social jolly afterwards.
It goes without saying there are many ceremony options available, though more for marriages than funerals. If a register office is deemed too sterile to get married in and you don’t want a church ceremony, you can choose any number of venues from a beach on a paradise buy cialis online melbourne island to an aristocratic stately pile. If a crematorium is deemed too soulless for your funeral plans, the alternatives are more limited.
Some non-religious folk opt for a church funeral followed by a brief committal at the crematorium, seeing this as the best way to do justice to the dead through words and music before the final farewell. However, while some liberal churches allow risqué eulogies and secular music, traditional churches remind us we’re in a house of God. When in Rome…
Some again opt for graveside ceremonies in woodland cemeteries, seeing this as solving the time problem of the crematorium, but with natural surroundings which might appeal more than incense-scented churches, with their icons making visible religious purpose.
Meanwhile, others are opting to get the cremation over with swiftly so they can plan a ceremony with the ashes rather than the body. This can, of course, be anything from the aforesaid memorial party, with urn of cremains in attendance, to something more ritualistic such as the scattering of ashes in a favoured, natural beauty spot.
Time and money are important considerations in life, and both can be found more readily with pre-planning. But there’s more to meaningful ceremony than advance scheduling and financial planning. Whether it’s a hit-the-spot celebration-of-life speech or a requiem mass, providers must provide, and receivers must be open to their cathartic potential. It’s a two-way process. Or is apathy as relevant a consumer choice as any other?
Lord Peter Ralfe Harrington Evans-Freke, 11th Baron of Carbery, was laid to rest yesterday in the family mausoleum in the chapel of Castlefreke beside his wife, Lady Joyzelle Carbery. There was a full Tridentine sung Latin mass at Rathbarry Church. Monks from Glenstal Abbey and Downside Abbey officiated.
In our thoughts today, the family and friends of sports fan and chartered accountant Conrad Readman, 49, who booked two weeks off work to watch the Olympics, bought tickets to all manner of events, and died yesterday of a heart attack while watching the bicycling in the velodrome.
This blog doesn’t go looking for trouble, but it occasionally splashes into a little local difficulty. Can’t be too careful what you say, that’s the moral. Actually, the only entity that ever threatened to sue us was Promessa. You can’t be too careful of your friends.
We got into perhaps our hottest water when surveying the way regulation of the funeral trade works in the US, back in January 2009. It concerned a law in Michigan which requires a family to engage a funeral director to supervise the handling, disposition and disinterment of a dead person. We got our information from Thomas Lynch (yes, the Thomas Lynch). He told us: “In our state of Michigan the occupational group charged with collecting and registering these vital statistics and medical certification is licensees in mortuary science … an occupational class which it licenses and regulates.” He added: “In Milford we can’t burn leaves in the autumn, bury our trash in the back yard, drive an unlicensed vehicle or tend to the duties of our toilet in public. Nor can we hunt squirrels, coyotes, deer or dogs in town. “We the people” have made our laws, on these and a million other matters. Including the dead.”
While this was going on, Lynch was busy suing Josh Slocum of the FCA and Lisa Carlson of the FEO, for libel. Both had vigorously attacked his defence of this law. When Lynch’s suit was thrown out we asked him to comment. He did so, on this blog, and was immediately counter-sued for costs by Slocum and Carlson on the strength of what he had said. It was embarrassing to be caught in the crossfire of people we admire greatly. Rupert Callender still writhes at the memory.
And so it came to pass that the GFG became Exhibit A in Case No. 08-CV-13949 UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN SOUTHERN DIVISION: “The primary bases for Defendants’ motions for attorneys fees are certain statements Lynch purportedly made in the weeks following the disposition of the case. In Charles Cowling’s blog entitled “The Good Funeral Guide,” Mr. Cowling made a post on August 17, 2009 captioned “That Tom Lynch libel case.” (See Def. FEO’s Mot. Br., at Ex. B.) In the comments following the post, Mr. Cowling stated that he received the following in an email from Thomas Lynch…”
You can read the email here.
It was a learning curve that left a nasty taste in the mouth. It probably converted all who followed it into militant non-regulators. Regulation is only attractive to people who are ignorant of unintended consequences.
Over in the US there’s an interesting case developing right now. Rabbi Daniel Wasserman is suing the Pennsylvania board of funeral directors because it insists on supervising his funerals. In the words of his lawsuit, Wasserman “is now being threatened with civil action and criminal prosecution … for conducting religious funerals in place of licensed funeral directors who, under color of state law, interfere in purely religious observances for no other justification than personal profit.”
Wasserman’s case is that, under Jewish law, the care of the dead cannot be delegated – and rabbis cannot become licensed funeral directors because embalming is anathema to Jews.
There are no public health issues, no dangers to wider society. The Department of Health agrees that Jewish custom abides by all health laws.
Regulation and licensing are clearly desirable in areas where public safety is concerned. It’s why you have to employ a Gas Safe registered person to work on your boiler so that you do not blow up your neighbours.
Anyone in the UK who favours licensing funeral directors must answer this question: Should the law compel you to engage a contractor to do what you can perfectly safely and competently do for yourself?
It really is that simple.
The Separation Line was produced over a fourteen-month period between 2010 and 2011 and observes how the repatriation ceremonies of Wootton Bassett provided a rite of passage, representing an insight into the ongoing experiences of British soldiers returning from War. During the two hour gathering and subsequent ten minute ceremony, lay all of those contradictory features which afford humans the capacity to laugh and cry together; the language of commemoration.
Representing the actual duration and structure of the ceremonies the film, composed from fourteen ceremonies, attempts to bring an audience into the midst of the repatriations, positioning the viewer as onlooker, witness, participatory performer and drawing upon a range of sensory situations and observations that define this collective experience.
For further information please download the research chapter The Separation Line as pdf, included in the publication “Border Visions: Borderlands in Film and Literature”, to be published by Scarecrow Press later this year or visit katiedavies.com
A very nice man called Ken Kolsbun wants to develop his board game idea. The game is called Funeral Director — A Race to Your Final Resting Place. Says Ken: “My immediate goal is to finalize our game (e.g. refine board top and card design and text, color and design all game pieces) and submit this playable prototype package to professional game manufacturers for mass production and distribution. I need to reach the required financial goal of at least $11,000 and with your help we can do it.”
Below is Ken’s description of his game.
HOW THE GAME IS PLAYED
Having died of Laughter, Boredom, Fright or a Broken Heart, etc., you now serve as your own Funeral Director. While piecing together your customized sendoff, you begin to explore different products and services available – this might ignite new thoughts and feelings about the funeral process. Players (best with four) move around the game board with their coffin markers, responding to Life, Debt and Last Will and Testament cards, while purchasing various Funeral Products (flowers, caskets, headstones, etc.) and Funeral Services (cosmetic care, cremation, transportation, etc.). Expect lots of nervous laughter as players reveal interesting stories, discuss personal “bucket list” dreams, etc. as they race to their chosen Final Resting Place (e.g. Eco Green Meadows, Family Farm, Sea Burial, etc.). The game encourages interaction among players, as everyone talks about personal funeral experiences, which are sometimes sad but often eye opening or humorous. Discussing embalming, environmental impact of cremations, land use, green burials, etc. and funeral costs will certainly raise the hair on anyone’s back! This board game offers a simple but realistic picture of the funeral process, the funeral industry itself, and alternatives to the traditional system. And yet, it keeps the subject lighthearted non-threatening and yes…fun!
A FUN WAY TO ADDRESS A TABOO SUBJECT
People often have phobias about death and funerals; professionals all agree it can be a difficult and often “forbidden” area of discussion. With this game (currently a preliminary design in a playable format) I have taken these serious topics to a lighthearted level to make it not only informative, but to open players minds to this very sensitive subject. FUNERAL DIRECTOR is intended to reveal personal attitudes and beliefs about death and its rituals; it will generate considerable lively conversation. It’s a tricky subject, but playing this game enables people to talk about it without the seriousness usually associated with this subject. Believe me this game experience is fun and speaks to human behavior. Even though we are often curious about the mystery of death, it’s a subject most of us like to avoid; we would like to encourage people to feel open in discussing these issues. Hopefully our game provides a comfortable format.
Find Ken’s website here.
John Graham leaves St Andrew’s United Reformed Church in his Fender Stratocaster coffin fashioned by — who else? — Crazy Coffins. The lifelong rocker came out to the strains of the Shadows’ Wonderful Land. Read the full story in the Mail here. Note: the Mail misattributes the making of the coffin to the funeral director.
Posted by Colin Moore
One of the toughest challenges anyone can face in their lifetime is losing a loved one and then having to guess what kind of funeral and memorial service they would have wanted, also to try to locate important documents and find the answers to key questions. But it does not have to be this way, by documenting our preferences and important details in advance of need, families can be spared making the difficult decisions of what to do next and avoid all of this uncertainty.
End of Life Planning is about thinking, discussing, planning and documenting the final event in our lives before it actually happens. It should be a big part and a necessary part of any estate or financial planning service. We cannot control how we die, but we can control how our finances will be managed, how our estate will be distributed, the sort of funeral we would like and what arrangements or messages we would like to leave behind for our families.
The worst time to plan a funeral is when someone has died. You only have an average of twenty-four to seventy-two hours to make all the arrangements, while also dealing with the emotional impact of the loss of a loved one. So, making difficult decisions which cannot be undone when you are overcome with grief is not the best time.
Making an End of Life Plan allows you to make extremely important decisions through a calm and clear thought-out process. In other words, it is much more likely that you will make more rational and logical decisions. This helps to ensure your funeral wishes and other family matters can be arranged in a more meaningful way, and the way you would have wanted.
Most people don’t know how to begin planning for life’s ending. But for everyone who has made a Will they have already taken a step in the right direction towards pre-planning their future wishes. The problem is, this form of planning alone fails to address their family’s immediate concerns between the time of death and and in the crucial days thereafter leading up to the funeral when major financial decisions have to be made.
The key to effective end-of-life planning is not to race through filling out legal documents but to take the time to understand the full scope of what is involved in putting our entire affairs in order and to seek out solid information on each topical area. Then we can fully embrace the whole process.
Although an End of Life Plan will not completely alleviate the emotional and financial pressures people will face, it will certainly help them reduce or eliminate many of the most stressful decisions, pressures, and expenses, and ultimately help ease the pain of a very difficult situation.
Colin Moore is founder of The Funeral Consultancy and regularly provides courses and seminars on Caring for The Bereaved and End of Life Planning.
ED’S NOTE: We are huge admirers of Colin here at the GFG. Goodness knows how much money his work has cost him (we know how it feels, Colin!). He is motivated entirely by a desire to be useful and helpful. Do check out his website. He has been tenacious and he has persevered. At long last his work is gaining official recognition in Leicestershire and, what’s more, financial backing from Big Society coffers. Colin, we salute you.
