I've derived so much knowledge and enjoyment from people looking at bones that I'd be delighted to be dug up by archaeologists. Not, as BT says, that I'll know anything about it.
I'm reminded of Shakespeare's epitaph which urges the reader, ' ... for Jesus's sake forbeare' from disturbing the dust enclosed there.
'Blessed be he that spares these stones.
But cursed be he who moves my bones.'
Interesting how bones and 'relics' were still to be accorded some dignity even after the Reformation. Perhaps they were concerned about souvenir hunters?
Coming back to Madagascar again, they have the ceremony of the 'Turning of The Bones' whereby bodies are exhumed after around 3 years, cleaned and then carefully wrapped in white scarves before being reburied with their names written in felt pin or placed in caves. Bones are treated with great reverence and dignity.
I wouldn't mind an archaeologist examining mine and I've noticed on some of these archaeological programmes on the telly how they are beginning to take a more 'reverent' attitude than they used to.
But I can understand why people wouldn't want their mortal remains interfered with.
It wouldn't worry me but then I would prefer to be buried rather than cremated so I do have some concerns in that respect - although I wouldn't expect everyone to share my views on this issue.
In urban Greece they are running out of burial space. They don't do cremations there. I think you'd have to go to Bulgaria for that. They do exhume bones and put them in ossuaries.
People in the US frequently scatter ashes at a place the deceased loved, sometimes illegally. A friend's family scattered a loved one's ashes at Santa Anita racetrack.
I can’t speak to British Presbyterian or Reformed practice, but there’s a long-standing strand of American Presbyterianism (or at least Southern American Presbyterianism) with a preference for burial attended just by family and close friends, followed as immediately as possible by the service at the church. (And the service is often followed in turn by a reception at the church where people can speak to the family.) In my experience, this way of doing things was often the preferred way for ministers and their families. It’s what my parents wanted, as well as much of my mother's extended family (lots of ministers).
We've had one like that at our (Presbyterian) home church not long ago. There was a small family gathering at the grave for the burial, and then they met a huge crowd back at the church for the service and a celebration. I think the sense was, "We've taken care of Jim - now let's celebrate him!" Which we did - it was a happy funeral for a good man whose life was worth celebrating generously. His family has a long history here and burial within the community seemed exactly right.
On the other hand, living in the same place, we are far from any family and thousands of miles from the oldest of our friends and family. It makes no sense (to me) to have any permanent memorial memorial in a place that nobody would ever have any reason to visit. I would like cremation to take place as quickly as possible and, sentimentally - my sentiments - my ashes to be taken to one of a handful of places in Scotland that have a strong connection for me, but does it matter to anyone else? The easy solution is to be scattered in the nearby river that flows into Lake Erie, so a little bit will eventually go over Niagara Falls - fun to think about.
I hate the UK practice of a service at a crematorium. Doing it remotely is fine with me, and perhaps a small service later in the church, with plenty of good music. With our family, good singing is too much to hope for. A rushed ceremony for my father with a rent-a-priest at a production line crematorium, with smoke blowing down as we left, was a harrowing experience I hope never to repeat. We scattered his ashes in the Clyde not far from where he was born, and that was good.
I am curious about the objection to archaeologists poring over your bones. What would be the problem with that?
I've seen Time Team poring over bones, speculating how they lived and died, what illnesses they had. "Ooooh look, Boogie had metal plates in her neck, how interesting."
No thanks, not over my bones.
But I'm still puzzled as to what the problem is exactly. Why is it a problem for someone to think you are interesting? Obviously archaeologists will speculate about what illnesses someone may have had, it's helpful for understanding historical approaches to illness and can even help current or future people with said illnesses (archaeology and forensics are after all closely related fields). If you're an organ donor for eg, I don't see how donating your bones to archaeology is ethically much different.
Personally, given that I'm not there to use my body anymore I would prefer my remains to be used to make the world a better place. Cremation is extremely polluting and doesn't seem to benefit anyone.
A new crematorium opened in 2009 just a mile or two from our house. At the planning consultation stage I submitted an objection that I thought cremation was bad for the environment compared to burial. I received a reply that the opposite was the case. I can't remember what evidence was cited and didn't go any further into it -partly because most such planning applications get through anyway.
What is the truth? Ashwashing?!
There was a 'CHP' proposal around here to use waste heat from a proposed crematorium for a swimming pool, but it was knocked back as distasteful. That was a shame from my perspective - I'd like for my Joules to do something useful. @Qoheleth (I think) knows a lot about that kind of thing, but I haven't seen him here for a long time.
AI tells me that 'human composting' or 'natural burial' are the most environmentally friendly ways to do it.
These raise other issues of course, such as the use of land and the availability of space for burials. The Greeks get around that by putting bones in ossuaries after a few years.
The place where my husband is buried was until recently agricultural land. When the farmer retired he turned two fields into a woodland burial ground, leaving his son to farm the rest of the land. Now a housing estate has been built opposite, but no doubt they are glad to know that no houses will be built opposite them. On the other side of the houses is a country park, made from a reclaimed colliery site. A new crematorium has recently opened a mile away and that is also in a rural setting. All makes sense to me.
Another natural burial ground was in the news yesterday as thieves uprooted and stole many of its young trees. That’s awful.
As an archaeologist, I've dug up quite a few skeletons in my time, and I remember it as quite a contemplative experience. We were always quite careful with the bones - though there was one grim experience where I'd exposed the skeleton, and was going to do the planning and get the photographer the following morning. In the night, there was a storm, and the grave cut had filled with water. There was nothing for it but to roll my sleeves up and delve into the muddy water to lift the bones out!
In the finds hut, one of our volunteers used to talk to the bones as she washed them - but she didn't like doing children (it was a medieval cemetery, so there were a few of them).
When all the research had been done, the bones were returned to the church - the graveyard had been made smaller at the end of the medieval period, so the church was still there on the edge of the archaeological site - and they were reburied with a service as close to the medieval service as they could manage.
Yesterday afternoon I was at a funeral of a friend at a local church. It was the first time I'd seen a wicker coffin in use. He was buried in the historic graveyard - he'd been part of the history project researching the graveyard and the nearby ringwork/medieval small castle.
The widespread belief that as bone meal is used as fertiliser, cremains must be good for the roses, unfortunately turns out to be rubbish. The bone meal one buys in garden centres etc is made by grinding up animal bones as a by-product from slaughterhouses. The animals have not been burnt.
When one is cremated, all the nutrients have gone up the chimney.
No, shouldn't joke. The Orthodox Church is strongly opposed to 'water cremation' for similar reasons to why we don't like the idea of conventional cremation.
It involves deliberate destruction of the body.
If that happens by accident or other means that's one thing, but to deliberately burn a body or liquefy it into mush, is, to the Orthodox mind, to show it disrespect.
Some of us would see it as tantamount to flushing it down the loo.
Now, don't get me wrong and don't misunderstand me nor take any offence if you are comfortable with the idea of cremation.
I certainly believe that it is possible to cremate a body reverently, if I can put it that way. As we've got some archaeologists here, I was interested to hear that excavations of some Bronze Age barrows near here back in the 1980s revealed that the nearby cremation pits has flues at the right angle required to channel the flames at the right consistency and temperature to consume a human body quickly and efficiently.
The conclusion was that the bodies weren't simply flung on a pyre and burnt but placed there with considerable care and attention.
Whatever the case, for my own part as an Orthodox Christian I would prefer to bury my relatives and be buried myself rather than cremate them either conventionally or by the 'water' system.
It's not that I don't believe that God can't 'reconstitute' the remains for the 'resurrection body'. Nor does it mean that I think he will cast those who cremate their relatives into outer darkness.
But I do see the Orthodox position as congruent with the creedal belief that we to expect the 'resurrection of the body' rather than disembodied spirits floating in the ether.
I believe in a 'new heaven and a new earth', not in the way that the Jehovah's Witnesses depict in 'The Watchtower' with cuddly lions and tigers and so on, but very 'real' nevertheless.
Call me old-fashioned but that's where I'm at with this. Ours is an Incarnational faith. Matter matters.
The way @Eigon describes the treatment of bones by his archaeological colleagues makes complete sense to me.
That doesn't mean I don't find some relics icky. I do. But theologically, I 'get' them and venerate them.
But I do see the Orthodox position as congruent with the creedal belief that we to expect the 'resurrection of the body' rather than disembodied spirits floating in the ether. . . .
Call me old-fashioned but that's where I'm at with this. Ours is an Incarnational faith. Matter matters.
Mine is an Incarnational faith, too. But it’s also a faith that if God is capable of resurrecting a body from what remains in a coffin or in the ground after decades or hundreds or thousands of years, God is equally capable of resurrecting a body from ashes. “You are dust, and to dust you shall return,” and all of that. Cremation just speeds along the process of returning to dust.
I suppose it depends on your cultural context, and how the action (cremation, burial, whatever) gets framed in that context. In my own, it would probably make no ripples at all for us to choose any of the standard ways of dealing with a body--and this is a pastor's family. In others where there's a long history of "reading" such choices as making theological statements, well...
I'm glad I don't have to cope with that, it would complicate things a great deal for me at a time when I can't cope already. But I see how others do have to cope.
I suppose it depends on your cultural context, and how the action (cremation, burial, whatever) gets framed in that context. In my own, it would probably make no ripples at all for us to choose any of the standard ways of dealing with a body--and this is a pastor's family. In others where there's a long history of "reading" such choices as making theological statements, well...
Yes, I think that makes sense, and it’s consistent with the point I was trying to make. That one church body or religious culture would see it as important or meaningful to prohibit cremation as a way of affirming the Incarnation and the Resurrection doesn’t mean that another church body or religious culture that allows cremation is denying the Incarnation or the resurrection of the body.
If I recall correctly, and someone who knows better can certainly correct me, the Catholic Church used to prohibit cremation, or at least discourage it. While burial is still preferred, cremation is allowed as along as it is not chosen to actually deny Catholic doctrine in some way, such as with intent to deny the resurrection of the body.
But I do see the Orthodox position as congruent with the creedal belief that we to expect the 'resurrection of the body' rather than disembodied spirits floating in the ether. . . .
Call me old-fashioned but that's where I'm at with this. Ours is an Incarnational faith. Matter matters.
Mine is an Incarnational faith, too. But it’s also a faith that if God is capable of resurrecting a body from what remains in a coffin or in the ground after decades or hundreds or thousands of years, God is equally capable of resurrecting a body from ashes. “You are dust, and to dust you shall return,” and all of that. Cremation just speeds along the process of returning to dust.
When I said 'ours' I meant the Christian faith in general. We all believe in the Incarnation.
Also, I made it clear that I believe that God is more than capable of reconstituting matter from dust, ashes and whatever else.
I also made it clear that I don't believe that God will condemn those Christians who cremate rather than bury their dead.
The point of the Orthodox position is that we shouldn't deliberately destroy the human body. Sure, cremation simply speeds up the 'to dust you shall return' process and I'm certainly not accusing other Christians of having nefarious intent or a slap-dash approach. I'm simply setting out the Orthodox position.
We share the same Incarnational faith but we differ in how we work that out in practice. I would venerate icons and relics for instance as I see that to be in keeping with my application of that Incarnational faith. Others may not see things that way. That doesn't mean they don't believe in the Incarnation.
I suppose it depends on your cultural context, and how the action (cremation, burial, whatever) gets framed in that context. In my own, it would probably make no ripples at all for us to choose any of the standard ways of dealing with a body--and this is a pastor's family. In others where there's a long history of "reading" such choices as making theological statements, well...
I'm glad I don't have to cope with that, it would complicate things a great deal for me at a time when I can't cope already. But I see how others do have to cope.
Sure, but if I'm allowed to use the 't' word, I also think 'tradition' and Tradition come into these things as well as cultural conditions.
Lex credendi, lex orandi, lex vivendi.
I come from a culture that very much values funerals and celebrations of the departed. As a Welsh priest I know puts it, 'We don't care about you when you're alive but we'll give you a pretty good send-off when you're dead!' 😉
I don't come from a culture that venerates relics or leaves coffin lids open during pre-funeral rituals and funerals themselves.
But I have joined a church culture which does. Do I find it disconcerting to stand over an open coffin chanting the Psalms? Yes, I do. But I've done it as a service to the family and outvof respect for the dead and the funerary rites of my particular Christian church.
I'm not saying everyone has to follow suit. You are all perfectly at liberty to practice whatever is in keeping with your Christian tradition, culture or approach.
And what you feel you can or can't cope with, whatever that might be.
Getting back to the original post, the daughter of someone I know just died (I'll be putting something about it on the prayer thread soon) and will have a wake/viewing on Tuesday of next week, church funeral Wednesday, and burial immediately after the funeral. No cremation.
What is the most environmentally friendly way of disposing a body?
I believe that electric direct cremation using renewable energy has quite a low carbon footprint. (Any method involving mourners is going to have a higher carbon footprint than the same method without mourners.)
I suppose it depends on your cultural context, and how the action (cremation, burial, whatever) gets framed in that context. … In others where there's a long history of "reading" such choices as making theological statements, well...
In the context of making statements, "up" is also an option…
Earth Rise
The Earth Rise will send a small amount of your loved ones’ ashes into space orbit, experiencing Zero gravity before the flight capsules and modules return to Earth as a Flown Keepsake…
Earth Orbit
The uniquely compelling Earth Orbit service places your loved one’s ashes into space aboard a Celestis spacecraft. Travelling into the earth’s orbit, where your loved one will traverse the sky for months and even years before cascading into the atmosphere blazing like a shooting star in a final tribute…
Luna Launch
Send your loved one on a journey to the Earth’s nearest neighbour the Moon, creating an easily viewable and constant memorial for the one you love to the Moon and Back with this permanent lunar memorial.
Voyager
For the true explorer in your life to go boldly into the cosmos on a permanent celestial journey into the solar system and deep space…
It's cremation, Jim, but not as we know it.
But if you want to let your "loved ones" know what you really think of them, few statements compare with the following take on sending your ashes skyward…
Each passenger travels into space aboard their own personal scatter vessel, lifted by biodegradable balloons filled with renewable hydrogen gas.
Once above 100,000 feet, our patented intelligent scatter vessel releases their ashes in a gentle cascade to be carried around the world in the arms of the stratospheric winds. Over a period of three to six months, the ashes will descend into the lower atmosphere before falling back to Earth in raindrops and snowflakes to become one with nature again.
But I do see the Orthodox position as congruent with the creedal belief that we to expect the 'resurrection of the body' rather than disembodied spirits floating in the ether. . . .
Call me old-fashioned but that's where I'm at with this. Ours is an Incarnational faith. Matter matters.
Mine is an Incarnational faith, too. But it’s also a faith that if God is capable of resurrecting a body from what remains in a coffin or in the ground after decades or hundreds or thousands of years, God is equally capable of resurrecting a body from ashes. “You are dust, and to dust you shall return,” and all of that. Cremation just speeds along the process of returning to dust.
When I said 'ours' I meant the Christian faith in general. We all believe in the Incarnation.
My partner was cremated, and ashes transported to her home country to be buried in the family plot alongside her father in the cemetery. But I kept back a small portion of ashes to put into some jewellery. It gives me great comfort and sense of connection to wear one of the necklaces, especially when visiting somewhere new, or somewhere that she had particularly wanted to go to, feeling that she is coming with me.
When I said 'ours' I meant the Christian faith in general. We all believe in the Incarnation.
Except for the Christians who do not believe in the Incarnation. For some years I reported to the minister of a United Church of Christ congregation who thinks Jesus was a great but entirely and only human teacher. He is hardly alone in that.
The notion that it is disrespectful to a dead body to destroy it strikes me as a matter of interpretation. One could just as easily see the rising smoke from a burning body as something akin to the smoke from a candle carrying one's prayers up to God. There's a certain logic to both narratives, but neither is really true.
And yes, perhaps I should have qualified my comment and not used 'all'. I know that all Christians don't believe in the Incarnation and I won't get drawn into speculation as to whether this undermines their 'right' to consider themselves 'proper' Christians or not. There are those who would do so.
I used 'our' in an attempt to be more inclusive, to widen things out from my own particular Tradition.
@Nick Tamen rightly sought clarity as to whether I meant 'ours' in the wider sense or whether I was claiming that only the Orthodox have an Incarnational faith.
Good call.
I made it clear that I meant the Christian faith more generally- but yes, I fully recognise that not all Christians would accept the Incarnation in the way that Nick and myself would - or others here with a 'traditional' take on these things.
All I'm saying is that from an Orthodox perspective, an Orthodox interpretation if you prefer, cremation is an option we prefer to avoid for the reasons I've stated.
That doesn't mean that unless other Christians agree with us on that they don't have an Incarnational faith or that we are accusing them of disrespecting or desecrating the remains of their loved ones.
I'm moved by some of the accounts Shipmates have posted here of how they commemorate their departed loved ones.
At some point my 'special friend' and I - I don’t know what term you use, 'girlfriend' sounds odd at our age - intend to visit a stretch of river where she and her mum scattered her father's ashes.
I will most likely say a prayer.
I won't criticise her for scattering his ashes on the water rather than having his body lowered into the ground as I'd do now.
'You evil, wicked heretick! How dare you sprinkle your father's ashes on the water instead of giving him a decent Christian burial like I would!'
I mean, come on ...
I interpret and practice the Christian faith in line with the particular flavour of it that I have chosen to part of. Other Shipmates do the same only from within their particular perspectives and traditions.
Some of that will resonate and overlap with my particular position, others less so and vice-versa.
I'm not saying that everyone should do as I do. No, they have the same right to act in accordance with their own conscience and beliefs and interpretation of these things as I have to exercise my faith in the way I interpret and understand it within my particular context.
I like John Donne on the subject (though I find it odd as part of a marriage sermon
There are so many evidences of the immortality of the soul, even to a natural man's reason, that it required not an article of the creed, to fix this notion of the immortality of the soul. But the resurrection of the body is discernible by no other light, but that of faith, nor could be fixed by any less assurance than an article of the creed. Where be all the splinters of that bone, which a shot hath shivered and scattered in the air? Where be all the atoms of that flesh, which a corrosive hath eat away, or a consumption hath breathed, and exhaled away from our arms, and other limbs? In what wrinkle, in what furrow, in what bowel of the earth, lie all the grains of the ashes of a body burnt a thousand years since? In what corner, in what ventricle of the sea, lies all the jelly of a body drowned in the general flood? what coherence, what sympathy, what dependence maintains any relation, any correspondence, between that arm which was lost in Europe, and that leg, that was lost in Africa or Asia, scores of years between? One humour of our dead body produces worms, and those worms suck and exhaust all other humour, and then all dies, and all dries, and moulders into dust, and that dust is blown into the river, and that puddled water tumbled into the sea, and that ebbs and flows in infinite revolutions, and still, still God knows in what cabinet every seed-pearl lies, in what part of the world every grain of every man's dust lies; and sibilat populum suum, (as his prophet speaks in another case4) he whispers, he hisses, he beckons for the bodies of his saints, and in the twinkling of an eye, that body that was scattered over all the elements, is sat down at[ the right hand of God, in a glorious resurrection. A dropsy hath extended me to an enormous corpulency, and unwieldiness; a consumption hath attenuated me to a feeble macilency and leanness, and God raises me a body, such as it should have been, if these infirmities had not intervened and deformed it. David could go no further in his book of Psalms, but to that, Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord'; Ye, says he, ye that have breath, praise ye the Lord, and that ends the book: but, that my dead body should come to praise the Lord, this is that new song, which I shall learn, and sing in heaven; when not only my soul shall magnify the Lord, and my spirit rejoice in God my Saviour; but I shall have mine old eyes, and ears, and tongue, and knees, and receive such glory in my body myself, as that, in that body, so glorified by God, I also shall glorify him.
(SERMON LXXXI.
Preached at the Earl of Bridgewater's House In London, At The Marriage of His Daughter, The Lady Mary, To The Eldest Son Of The Lord Herbert Of Castle-Island, November 19, 1627)
I am going to step on a lot of toes here, but here goes. A lot more people loved the deceased than just the immediate family. Funerals are an important rite of closure for many people who knew and loved the deceased. They are one of the oldest things that mark us as human beings. I think it is very near-sighted bordering on selfish for someone to say "I don't need a funeral, therefore nobody else does."
Astonished at my 98 year old mother's funeral last year over 60 people attended in person and others including my South American based son could watch the streaming service.
I quite like the way that what's done with the body seems to be becoming detached from what the rememberers do to mark someone's passing, if not from what the nearest and dearest do.
I'm also intrigued by the disparate nature of the deceased's wishes. The spectrum is wide, from extreme individualism (making a statement), to thinking of those closest to them.
Maybe the best argument for respecting the wishes of the dead is to stop the living arguing about it. But if those most affected are in agreement, why shouldn't they be able to do what works best for them? And why should friends have any say about what happens to the body?
Burn me to a crisp and blast me into space. But if my surviving kin want to send me up in a balloon to piss from a great height on the heads of climate change deniers (which could be high up their list), I'm OK with that. I'd also be OK with feeding the ducks on Ilkley (or any other) Moor. Although the Friends of Ilkley Tarn would rather we didn't.
As long as the weather is godforsakenly awful when (or if) my passing is marked in some way, I'm not bothered whether the body is cremated, buried, composted or liquefied.
Again, it all depends on a whole range of factors, social and corporate, individual, familial, theological ...
Heck, as we can see from this thread even those of us who share a common belief in the Incarnation differ as to how we interpret or 'apply' that in our funerary arrangements.
FWIW I don't think I'm disaggregating the disposal of the corpse from the corporate or communal element- although I certainly wish that the Orthodox would take more account of the wishes of friends or family when it comes to funeral services and such.
It's not an issue so much with the deceased from majority-Orthodox countries of course. They are used to open coffins and all-night vigils around the coffin with Psalms.
Kids run about. Relatives hand out hot drinks and refreshments. Nobody bats an eyelid. Kids play close to the coffin.
Where we may run into problems of course is where the deceased is a convert or not from an 'ethnically' Orthodox background as it were.
Relatives might be horrified to see their loved one exposed in an open coffin with a rota (roster?) of people chanting Psalms all night long and others chatting convivially close by.
In such instances parishioners will tend to observe the customary rites separately and even seal the coffin afterwards if it's going to cause offence - but not always.
I hope to be able to involve my family and explain how we do things before my time comes.
We don't tend to go on for eulogies and so on. We just do it 'straight.' Shame. My ego is such as I'd like to earwig on what people say about me ...;)
I know of someone who was interested in Orthodoxy and even sang with our choir for a while as she was an 'enquirer' and who decided that it wasn't for her after she sang at an Orthodox funeral.
It was 'too much' for her. She couldn't take it.
Conversely, I know of someone else who'd been on the fringes for a while, her husband had already converted, and for whom an Orthodox funeral was what nudged her over the line. The directness of it. The no-messing about.
No prisoners.
The level of involvement from the wider family or community is going to vary of course. In some Greek parishes people from the congregation join in with the clergy and the couple in the exchanging of rings to show their identification and solidarity with what's going on.
In our parish that doesn't happen. Shame. I think it would be lovely if it did.
We no longer live in homogeneous 'Christendom' societies and haven't done for some considerable time.
The post-Reformation churches have developed their own ceremonies and norms. Secularism has brought in other ways of doing things. Other faiths have different practices again.
However we do these things they are going to reflect our values and world-views, be it being hoisted in a balloon for a post-mortem piss on those we disagree with or whether we lie in an open coffin all night with people chanting Psalms and kids playing around and staying up late.
I've chosen to be buried because of my gut feeling that burning seems a terribly violent thing to do to a body that has served me well for 60+ years. My parents and brothers chose cremation, however, and I regard that as their choice and don't feel disturbed about it. My husband also wishes to be cremated and was a bit iffy about my choice. He has kept the box of ashes of his father here, and I'm pretty iffy about that, and there's no danger of him doing the same with me if I predecease him and am to be buried.
My mother left detailed funeral instructions; my brothers didn't. In fact, the second brother to die was adamant he "didn't want anything" - no service, no music, no remembrance, nothing. But his death was traumatic and we needed a service for some sort of settling and closure. I am sure he understands.
My wife and I have chosen to be cremated. Maybe 15 or 20 years ago, we purchased niches in a columbarium in a church-related place that is like a second home for our family, so we know it’s a place our kids can easily come to if they want to.
We have both planned our funerals.
Standard requiems with favourite music and readings, immediate family to the crem, and a wake at a local venue. Hopefully it takes the burden of some decisions off the kids' shoulders.
At my late husband's service, many who did not know each other came and followed a wide variety of faiths. So I did something unusual for the church: I had a brunch gathering before the service, with a reading about him. Giving those attending a chance to meet and share how they knew him. We then gathered in the church for the service (No communion). And everyone left immediately afterward. I received a letter from our priest afterward, saying he was not so sure about my idea but found it one of the most touching services he had observed. His ashes were taken under the Golden Gate Bridge and out to sea, where he had often patrolled when in the Coast Guard. I plan on my ashes joining his there when the time has come, as we met in San Francisco.
The bigger issue with cremation is the air pollution caused by burning - even if the fuel is renewable, it doesn't solve the problem of air pollution. Think of wood-burning stoves, great from a renewable energy perspective (and also very efficient) but they still cause serious harm via the particulate in the smoke. Smoke is carcinogenic regardless of what is being burned, which is why smoking things that aren't tobacco still hugely increases the risk of cancer. There's also no way of burning a body that doesn't cause harmful smoke.
Now obviously basically everything enjoyable or labour-saving is carcinogenic, and you do have to weigh up the pros and cons as with anything else (eg if you live on a narrowboat, a wood-burning stove is a much more reasonable option than if you were living in a regular suburban house). But I do think that what you choose for your final act is more significant than most decisions a person makes over their lifetime, and I do think that choosing an environmentally-friendly option should be important to Christians. It does strike me as being a bit odd that churches that promote environmental stewardship in other areas haven't done so in this area.
Well, there's this, then. The only real alternative to cremation where I am is burial--which involves about five to ten times the expense, uses land which could be farmed or used for housing, and legally requires a coffin (with all the ecological costs involved with that) and an outer concrete vault (ditto). Plus the risk of polluting ground water. And that's assuming you don't go for embalming, which most people having burial here do, given the custom of open viewings.
The bigger issue with cremation is the air pollution caused by burning - even if the fuel is renewable, it doesn't solve the problem of air pollution. Think of wood-burning stoves, great from a renewable energy perspective (and also very efficient) but they still cause serious harm via the particulate in the smoke. Smoke is carcinogenic regardless of what is being burned, which is why smoking things that aren't tobacco still hugely increases the risk of cancer. There's also no way of burning a body that doesn't cause harmful smoke.
Thanks Pomona.
For anyone who wants more detail about the emissions, I found this overview of the environmental impact of cremation from ShunWaste helpful. (Albeit with some highly inappropriate ads.)
Now obviously basically everything enjoyable or labour-saving is carcinogenic, and you do have to weigh up the pros and cons as with anything else (eg if you live on a narrowboat, a wood-burning stove is a much more reasonable option than if you were living in a regular suburban house). But I do think that what you choose for your final act is more significant than most decisions a person makes over their lifetime, and I do think that choosing an environmentally-friendly option should be important to Christians. It does strike me as being a bit odd that churches that promote environmental stewardship in other areas haven't done so in this area.
I don't think it's that odd. Many expressions of Christianity are predicated on the notion that the spiritual aspects of death matter more than the temporal aspects. Stewardship of the planet is rarely the top priority.
Well, there's this, then. The only real alternative to cremation where I am is burial--which involves about five to ten times the expense, uses land which could be farmed or used for housing, and legally requires a coffin (with all the ecological costs involved with that) and an outer concrete vault (ditto). Plus the risk of polluting ground water. And that's assuming you don't go for embalming, which most people having burial here do, given the custom of open viewings.
Against all that, cremation seems ... sensible?
"Affordable" is the word that came to my mind. What you describe is what happens when you leave the disposal of human remains to a free market operating within a particular regulatory context. Authorities, if motivated, could promote the use of other methods, such as composting or alkaline hydrolysis (aka water cremation). But this does also raise the usual questions about choice and inequality. As well as how the traditional cremation industry is reacting to the prospect of losing market share.
Meanwhile, I've learned that the word for the "effluent rich in organic matter and inorganic elements produced during the decomposition of corpses" in cemeteries is the charmingly coined "necroleachate". I can already imagine the outlines of a campaign to promote alternative methods of disposal…
Perhaps this displays my interest in industrial history, but 'cooked in an oxygen-free retort to release gas, creosote and coking carbon' would be an interesting way to be recycled, though Victorian gasworks are not associated with a low environmental impact. (My mourners, if any, could eventually be sent a bar of Mark-tar soap). How about 'run through a mechanically-recovered meat plant, for dog food'?
Well, there's this, then. The only real alternative to cremation where I am is burial--which involves about five to ten times the expense, uses land which could be farmed or used for housing, and legally requires a coffin (with all the ecological costs involved with that) and an outer concrete vault (ditto). Plus the risk of polluting ground water. And that's assuming you don't go for embalming, which most people having burial here do, given the custom of open viewings.
Against all that, cremation seems ... sensible?
Oh for sure - I would definitely view this as being akin to the wood-burning stove on a narrowboat example. And embalming is important to bring up, so thanks for raising it. It does make burial much more evenly-matched with cremation.
I definitely appreciate how complicated end of life decisions can be even without taking the environment into consideration. It just seems strange to me that the environment - coming from a UK perspective where many churches seek an "eco church" certification in the same way they might seek a "fairtrade church" certification - is seemingly not even part of the conversation within churches.
@pease many churches seek "eco church" certification, and there has in general been a huge increase in acknowledgement of the climate emergency in many UK churches. Certainly, a lot of the more conservative Evangelical suspicion towards anthropogenic climate change seems to have faded away or disappeared entirely in recent years. I think perhaps the lack of conversation around the environment and death is more to do with not wanting to discuss death at all.
Perhaps this displays my interest in industrial history, but 'cooked in an oxygen-free retort to release gas, creosote and coking carbon' would be an interesting way to be recycled, though Victorian gasworks are not associated with a low environmental impact. (My mourners, if any, could eventually be sent a bar of Mark-tar soap). How about 'run through a mechanically-recovered meat plant, for dog food'?
Pet food in the UK at least is actually required to be safe for human consumption, and is taste-tested by humans as part of the quality control process. This is why you don't see mouse-flavoured cat food!
Perhaps this displays my interest in industrial history, but 'cooked in an oxygen-free retort to release gas, creosote and coking carbon' would be an interesting way to be recycled, though Victorian gasworks are not associated with a low environmental impact. (My mourners, if any, could eventually be sent a bar of Mark-tar soap). How about 'run through a mechanically-recovered meat plant, for dog food'?
Well, there's this, then. The only real alternative to cremation where I am is burial--which involves about five to ten times the expense, uses land which could be farmed or used for housing, and legally requires a coffin (with all the ecological costs involved with that) and an outer concrete vault (ditto).
I wonder where you are? - presumably not the UK. Here a coffin can be made of wicker, basket-weave or cardboard, although there is no legal requirement to have one, so a shroud or cloth wrapping can suffice. It is placed directly into the hole - no concrete, unless there are any local regulations which mandate this - I've never heard of any.
Comments
'Blessed be he that spares these stones.
But cursed be he who moves my bones.'
Interesting how bones and 'relics' were still to be accorded some dignity even after the Reformation. Perhaps they were concerned about souvenir hunters?
Coming back to Madagascar again, they have the ceremony of the 'Turning of The Bones' whereby bodies are exhumed after around 3 years, cleaned and then carefully wrapped in white scarves before being reburied with their names written in felt pin or placed in caves. Bones are treated with great reverence and dignity.
I wouldn't mind an archaeologist examining mine and I've noticed on some of these archaeological programmes on the telly how they are beginning to take a more 'reverent' attitude than they used to.
But I can understand why people wouldn't want their mortal remains interfered with.
It wouldn't worry me but then I would prefer to be buried rather than cremated so I do have some concerns in that respect - although I wouldn't expect everyone to share my views on this issue.
In urban Greece they are running out of burial space. They don't do cremations there. I think you'd have to go to Bulgaria for that. They do exhume bones and put them in ossuaries.
We've had one like that at our (Presbyterian) home church not long ago. There was a small family gathering at the grave for the burial, and then they met a huge crowd back at the church for the service and a celebration. I think the sense was, "We've taken care of Jim - now let's celebrate him!" Which we did - it was a happy funeral for a good man whose life was worth celebrating generously. His family has a long history here and burial within the community seemed exactly right.
On the other hand, living in the same place, we are far from any family and thousands of miles from the oldest of our friends and family. It makes no sense (to me) to have any permanent memorial memorial in a place that nobody would ever have any reason to visit. I would like cremation to take place as quickly as possible and, sentimentally - my sentiments - my ashes to be taken to one of a handful of places in Scotland that have a strong connection for me, but does it matter to anyone else? The easy solution is to be scattered in the nearby river that flows into Lake Erie, so a little bit will eventually go over Niagara Falls - fun to think about.
I hate the UK practice of a service at a crematorium. Doing it remotely is fine with me, and perhaps a small service later in the church, with plenty of good music. With our family, good singing is too much to hope for. A rushed ceremony for my father with a rent-a-priest at a production line crematorium, with smoke blowing down as we left, was a harrowing experience I hope never to repeat. We scattered his ashes in the Clyde not far from where he was born, and that was good.
But I'm still puzzled as to what the problem is exactly. Why is it a problem for someone to think you are interesting? Obviously archaeologists will speculate about what illnesses someone may have had, it's helpful for understanding historical approaches to illness and can even help current or future people with said illnesses (archaeology and forensics are after all closely related fields). If you're an organ donor for eg, I don't see how donating your bones to archaeology is ethically much different.
Personally, given that I'm not there to use my body anymore I would prefer my remains to be used to make the world a better place. Cremation is extremely polluting and doesn't seem to benefit anyone.
I'm just as puzzled and I agree with you. Yes, I am down to be an organ donor.
But I can't shake off the feeling - and it's a strong feeling. No poring over my bones!
What is the most environmentally friendly way of disposing a body?
What is the truth? Ashwashing?!
There is a process by which you can be turned into compost or you can be buried in a mushroom coffin.
These raise other issues of course, such as the use of land and the availability of space for burials. The Greeks get around that by putting bones in ossuaries after a few years.
No easy answer to this one.
https://www.funeralguide.co.uk/help-resources/arranging-a-funeral/funeral-guides/a-guide-to-water-cremation
Another natural burial ground was in the news yesterday as thieves uprooted and stole many of its young trees. That’s awful.
In the finds hut, one of our volunteers used to talk to the bones as she washed them - but she didn't like doing children (it was a medieval cemetery, so there were a few of them).
When all the research had been done, the bones were returned to the church - the graveyard had been made smaller at the end of the medieval period, so the church was still there on the edge of the archaeological site - and they were reburied with a service as close to the medieval service as they could manage.
Yesterday afternoon I was at a funeral of a friend at a local church. It was the first time I'd seen a wicker coffin in use. He was buried in the historic graveyard - he'd been part of the history project researching the graveyard and the nearby ringwork/medieval small castle.
When one is cremated, all the nutrients have gone up the chimney.
Over my dead body!
😉
No, shouldn't joke. The Orthodox Church is strongly opposed to 'water cremation' for similar reasons to why we don't like the idea of conventional cremation.
It involves deliberate destruction of the body.
If that happens by accident or other means that's one thing, but to deliberately burn a body or liquefy it into mush, is, to the Orthodox mind, to show it disrespect.
Some of us would see it as tantamount to flushing it down the loo.
Now, don't get me wrong and don't misunderstand me nor take any offence if you are comfortable with the idea of cremation.
I certainly believe that it is possible to cremate a body reverently, if I can put it that way. As we've got some archaeologists here, I was interested to hear that excavations of some Bronze Age barrows near here back in the 1980s revealed that the nearby cremation pits has flues at the right angle required to channel the flames at the right consistency and temperature to consume a human body quickly and efficiently.
The conclusion was that the bodies weren't simply flung on a pyre and burnt but placed there with considerable care and attention.
Whatever the case, for my own part as an Orthodox Christian I would prefer to bury my relatives and be buried myself rather than cremate them either conventionally or by the 'water' system.
It's not that I don't believe that God can't 'reconstitute' the remains for the 'resurrection body'. Nor does it mean that I think he will cast those who cremate their relatives into outer darkness.
But I do see the Orthodox position as congruent with the creedal belief that we to expect the 'resurrection of the body' rather than disembodied spirits floating in the ether.
I believe in a 'new heaven and a new earth', not in the way that the Jehovah's Witnesses depict in 'The Watchtower' with cuddly lions and tigers and so on, but very 'real' nevertheless.
Call me old-fashioned but that's where I'm at with this. Ours is an Incarnational faith. Matter matters.
The way @Eigon describes the treatment of bones by his archaeological colleagues makes complete sense to me.
That doesn't mean I don't find some relics icky. I do. But theologically, I 'get' them and venerate them.
I'm glad I don't have to cope with that, it would complicate things a great deal for me at a time when I can't cope already. But I see how others do have to cope.
If I recall correctly, and someone who knows better can certainly correct me, the Catholic Church used to prohibit cremation, or at least discourage it. While burial is still preferred, cremation is allowed as along as it is not chosen to actually deny Catholic doctrine in some way, such as with intent to deny the resurrection of the body.
When I said 'ours' I meant the Christian faith in general. We all believe in the Incarnation.
Also, I made it clear that I believe that God is more than capable of reconstituting matter from dust, ashes and whatever else.
I also made it clear that I don't believe that God will condemn those Christians who cremate rather than bury their dead.
The point of the Orthodox position is that we shouldn't deliberately destroy the human body. Sure, cremation simply speeds up the 'to dust you shall return' process and I'm certainly not accusing other Christians of having nefarious intent or a slap-dash approach. I'm simply setting out the Orthodox position.
We share the same Incarnational faith but we differ in how we work that out in practice. I would venerate icons and relics for instance as I see that to be in keeping with my application of that Incarnational faith. Others may not see things that way. That doesn't mean they don't believe in the Incarnation.
Sure, but if I'm allowed to use the 't' word, I also think 'tradition' and Tradition come into these things as well as cultural conditions.
Lex credendi, lex orandi, lex vivendi.
I come from a culture that very much values funerals and celebrations of the departed. As a Welsh priest I know puts it, 'We don't care about you when you're alive but we'll give you a pretty good send-off when you're dead!' 😉
I don't come from a culture that venerates relics or leaves coffin lids open during pre-funeral rituals and funerals themselves.
But I have joined a church culture which does. Do I find it disconcerting to stand over an open coffin chanting the Psalms? Yes, I do. But I've done it as a service to the family and outvof respect for the dead and the funerary rites of my particular Christian church.
I'm not saying everyone has to follow suit. You are all perfectly at liberty to practice whatever is in keeping with your Christian tradition, culture or approach.
And what you feel you can or can't cope with, whatever that might be.
In the context of making statements, "up" is also an option… It's cremation, Jim, but not as we know it.
But if you want to let your "loved ones" know what you really think of them, few statements compare with the following take on sending your ashes skyward…
Except for the Christians who do not believe in the Incarnation. For some years I reported to the minister of a United Church of Christ congregation who thinks Jesus was a great but entirely and only human teacher. He is hardly alone in that.
The notion that it is disrespectful to a dead body to destroy it strikes me as a matter of interpretation. One could just as easily see the rising smoke from a burning body as something akin to the smoke from a candle carrying one's prayers up to God. There's a certain logic to both narratives, but neither is really true.
And yes, perhaps I should have qualified my comment and not used 'all'. I know that all Christians don't believe in the Incarnation and I won't get drawn into speculation as to whether this undermines their 'right' to consider themselves 'proper' Christians or not. There are those who would do so.
I used 'our' in an attempt to be more inclusive, to widen things out from my own particular Tradition.
@Nick Tamen rightly sought clarity as to whether I meant 'ours' in the wider sense or whether I was claiming that only the Orthodox have an Incarnational faith.
Good call.
I made it clear that I meant the Christian faith more generally- but yes, I fully recognise that not all Christians would accept the Incarnation in the way that Nick and myself would - or others here with a 'traditional' take on these things.
All I'm saying is that from an Orthodox perspective, an Orthodox interpretation if you prefer, cremation is an option we prefer to avoid for the reasons I've stated.
That doesn't mean that unless other Christians agree with us on that they don't have an Incarnational faith or that we are accusing them of disrespecting or desecrating the remains of their loved ones.
I'm moved by some of the accounts Shipmates have posted here of how they commemorate their departed loved ones.
At some point my 'special friend' and I - I don’t know what term you use, 'girlfriend' sounds odd at our age - intend to visit a stretch of river where she and her mum scattered her father's ashes.
I will most likely say a prayer.
I won't criticise her for scattering his ashes on the water rather than having his body lowered into the ground as I'd do now.
'You evil, wicked heretick! How dare you sprinkle your father's ashes on the water instead of giving him a decent Christian burial like I would!'
I mean, come on ...
I interpret and practice the Christian faith in line with the particular flavour of it that I have chosen to part of. Other Shipmates do the same only from within their particular perspectives and traditions.
Some of that will resonate and overlap with my particular position, others less so and vice-versa.
I'm not saying that everyone should do as I do. No, they have the same right to act in accordance with their own conscience and beliefs and interpretation of these things as I have to exercise my faith in the way I interpret and understand it within my particular context.
Preached at the Earl of Bridgewater's House In London, At The Marriage of His Daughter, The Lady Mary, To The Eldest Son Of The Lord Herbert Of Castle-Island, November 19, 1627)
Astonished at my 98 year old mother's funeral last year over 60 people attended in person and others including my South American based son could watch the streaming service.
Preach it, brother!
Or, to quote Van The Man, 'Rave on John Donne ...'
I'm also intrigued by the disparate nature of the deceased's wishes. The spectrum is wide, from extreme individualism (making a statement), to thinking of those closest to them.
Maybe the best argument for respecting the wishes of the dead is to stop the living arguing about it. But if those most affected are in agreement, why shouldn't they be able to do what works best for them? And why should friends have any say about what happens to the body?
Burn me to a crisp and blast me into space. But if my surviving kin want to send me up in a balloon to piss from a great height on the heads of climate change deniers (which could be high up their list), I'm OK with that. I'd also be OK with feeding the ducks on Ilkley (or any other) Moor. Although the Friends of Ilkley Tarn would rather we didn't.
As long as the weather is godforsakenly awful when (or if) my passing is marked in some way, I'm not bothered whether the body is cremated, buried, composted or liquefied.
Heck, as we can see from this thread even those of us who share a common belief in the Incarnation differ as to how we interpret or 'apply' that in our funerary arrangements.
FWIW I don't think I'm disaggregating the disposal of the corpse from the corporate or communal element- although I certainly wish that the Orthodox would take more account of the wishes of friends or family when it comes to funeral services and such.
It's not an issue so much with the deceased from majority-Orthodox countries of course. They are used to open coffins and all-night vigils around the coffin with Psalms.
Kids run about. Relatives hand out hot drinks and refreshments. Nobody bats an eyelid. Kids play close to the coffin.
Where we may run into problems of course is where the deceased is a convert or not from an 'ethnically' Orthodox background as it were.
Relatives might be horrified to see their loved one exposed in an open coffin with a rota (roster?) of people chanting Psalms all night long and others chatting convivially close by.
In such instances parishioners will tend to observe the customary rites separately and even seal the coffin afterwards if it's going to cause offence - but not always.
I hope to be able to involve my family and explain how we do things before my time comes.
We don't tend to go on for eulogies and so on. We just do it 'straight.' Shame. My ego is such as I'd like to earwig on what people say about me ...;)
I know of someone who was interested in Orthodoxy and even sang with our choir for a while as she was an 'enquirer' and who decided that it wasn't for her after she sang at an Orthodox funeral.
It was 'too much' for her. She couldn't take it.
Conversely, I know of someone else who'd been on the fringes for a while, her husband had already converted, and for whom an Orthodox funeral was what nudged her over the line. The directness of it. The no-messing about.
No prisoners.
The level of involvement from the wider family or community is going to vary of course. In some Greek parishes people from the congregation join in with the clergy and the couple in the exchanging of rings to show their identification and solidarity with what's going on.
In our parish that doesn't happen. Shame. I think it would be lovely if it did.
We no longer live in homogeneous 'Christendom' societies and haven't done for some considerable time.
The post-Reformation churches have developed their own ceremonies and norms. Secularism has brought in other ways of doing things. Other faiths have different practices again.
However we do these things they are going to reflect our values and world-views, be it being hoisted in a balloon for a post-mortem piss on those we disagree with or whether we lie in an open coffin all night with people chanting Psalms and kids playing around and staying up late.
My mother left detailed funeral instructions; my brothers didn't. In fact, the second brother to die was adamant he "didn't want anything" - no service, no music, no remembrance, nothing. But his death was traumatic and we needed a service for some sort of settling and closure. I am sure he understands.
Standard requiems with favourite music and readings, immediate family to the crem, and a wake at a local venue. Hopefully it takes the burden of some decisions off the kids' shoulders.
Now obviously basically everything enjoyable or labour-saving is carcinogenic, and you do have to weigh up the pros and cons as with anything else (eg if you live on a narrowboat, a wood-burning stove is a much more reasonable option than if you were living in a regular suburban house). But I do think that what you choose for your final act is more significant than most decisions a person makes over their lifetime, and I do think that choosing an environmentally-friendly option should be important to Christians. It does strike me as being a bit odd that churches that promote environmental stewardship in other areas haven't done so in this area.
Against all that, cremation seems ... sensible?
For anyone who wants more detail about the emissions, I found this overview of the environmental impact of cremation from ShunWaste helpful. (Albeit with some highly inappropriate ads.)
I don't think it's that odd. Many expressions of Christianity are predicated on the notion that the spiritual aspects of death matter more than the temporal aspects. Stewardship of the planet is rarely the top priority.
"Affordable" is the word that came to my mind. What you describe is what happens when you leave the disposal of human remains to a free market operating within a particular regulatory context. Authorities, if motivated, could promote the use of other methods, such as composting or alkaline hydrolysis (aka water cremation). But this does also raise the usual questions about choice and inequality. As well as how the traditional cremation industry is reacting to the prospect of losing market share.
Meanwhile, I've learned that the word for the "effluent rich in organic matter and inorganic elements produced during the decomposition of corpses" in cemeteries is the charmingly coined "necroleachate". I can already imagine the outlines of a campaign to promote alternative methods of disposal…
Oh for sure - I would definitely view this as being akin to the wood-burning stove on a narrowboat example. And embalming is important to bring up, so thanks for raising it. It does make burial much more evenly-matched with cremation.
I definitely appreciate how complicated end of life decisions can be even without taking the environment into consideration. It just seems strange to me that the environment - coming from a UK perspective where many churches seek an "eco church" certification in the same way they might seek a "fairtrade church" certification - is seemingly not even part of the conversation within churches.
Pet food in the UK at least is actually required to be safe for human consumption, and is taste-tested by humans as part of the quality control process. This is why you don't see mouse-flavoured cat food!
We're getting a bit Mega-City One now...
Natural burial doesn't involve embalming.
The Orthodox don't tend to go in for embalming either.
I'm obviously in favour of burials rather than cremation but it's not a simple or problem-free option as @Lamb Chopped has indicated.
Not heard of concrete vaults but imagine there must be a geological reason for that, shifting sand or soil or something along those lines.
Space is clearly an issue and there are problems with that in Greece.