Thoughts on Funerals

[sleepless]

jimbo, thank you for sharing your thoughts. The place where your wife's ashes are buried sounds so nice, in a glade, where you can sit comfortably to remember. And the memories you will have, after so many years of married life!
I would think (and doesn't this happen with so many things?) that it was the unexpectedness (the ashes being buried as opposed to scattered,)that upset you for a time.



Norman, I know Martindale. What a good choice, such an array of fells, the valley, the farms, the church......heaven on earth.

 

[Cate]

Grommit how right you are, how things have changed.

I am not sure if it was a 'Welsh' thing, when I was a girl women did not attend at the graveside, that was ‘men only’, the women returned to the home after the Service and got on with making the boiled ham sandwiches and making the tea for the wake, and making sure a candle was burning in the window.

Cremation was something that didn’t happen within the RC community I think until about 1965/66, and mum was very traditional in her views, so mum was buried along with my dad, and I don’t want to be cremated either, I guess the teachings of my youth have stayed with me too.

When my brother, my son and me went to the funeral directors to make arrangements for mum, I have to say when the lady left us to 'view' the coffin catalogue we inappropriately had a fit of the giggles, just because we could all hear mum saying to us, as she had many times over the years, 'no plywood mind, and you make sure it has decent handles', so no 'green eco' wicker for my mum.

Something else that seems now to have disappeared is the vigil which would have been held the night before the funeral. I remember this taking place for my grandmother, but this was in the days where the deceased was kept at home until the funeral. I did place mums rosary between her hands, I remembered she had done this for my nana.

We had the traditional hymns for mum, The Old Rugged Cross etc., but we also broke with tradition and had her favourite piece of music played as we were leaving church Concierto de Aranjuez.

It seems that it is practice now for funeral directors to take the deceased into church on a trolley, we were told they don’t ‘carry’ anymore, health and safety!!

Grommit I hope it’s a good year for you and the family, its about your turn now chuck.

Love
Cate xxx

 

[noelphobic]

Grommit how right you are, how things have changed.

I am not sure if it was a 'Welsh' thing, when I was a girl women did not attend at the graveside, that was ‘men only’, the women returned to the home after the Service and got on with making the boiled ham sandwiches and making the tea for the wake, and making sure a candle was burning in the window.

Cremation was something that didn’t happen within the RC community I think until about 1965/66, and mum was very traditional in her views, so mum was buried along with my dad, and I don’t want to be cremated either, I guess the teachings of my youth have stayed with me too.

When my brother, my son and me went to the funeral directors to make arrangements for mum, I have to say when the lady left us to 'view' the coffin catalogue we inappropriately had a fit of the giggles, just because we could all hear mum saying to us, as she had many times over the years, 'no plywood mind, and you make sure it has decent handles', so no 'green eco' wicker for my mum.

Something else that seems now to have disappeared is the vigil which would have been held the night before the funeral. I remember this taking place for my grandmother, but this was in the days where the deceased was kept at home until the funeral. I did place mums rosary between her hands, I remembered she had done this for my nana.

We had the traditional hymns for mum, The Old Rugged Cross etc., but we also broke with tradition and had her favourite piece of music played as we were leaving church Concierto de Aranjuez.

It seems that it is practice now for funeral directors to take the deceased into church on a trolley, we were told they don’t ‘carry’ anymore, health and safety!!

Grommit I hope it’s a good year for you and the family, its about your turn now chuck.

Love
Cate xxx

generally here only family go to the graveside. It is still fairly frequent that the bodies go home for a day or two before the service. Very large Catholic community of Irish ectraction here - the Pope should have remembered that when he visited the UK!

My parents were carried into church by family members. I have noticed that in America the coffin tends to be carried low down, rather than on the shoulders, unless it is a military funeral. At least that's what happens on the TV - I'm not a professional mourner, honest They also sometimes have open coffins at the service.