The long-held tradition of having a hushed funeral service with family and friends whispering and tiptoeing around may have been formally broken.  Respect for the deceased has been recast, replacing passive mourning with active celebration.

When did this happen?  Funeral celebrations have actually been around for centuries in various cultures and in certain religious groups, but for the most part, the majority of people still expect funerals to be a depressing and painful ordeal.   Now, however, more and more people are opting for their loved one’s funeral to become a genuine celebration, realizing that this is what they have wanted all along—to remember their loved one in a loving, joyful way.

Maybe the fear of breaking with tradition has kept funerals in a one note melody for so long.  Or maybe people were afraid of disrespecting the decease or offending a relative’s sensibilities if the funeral were drastically changed.  But if the point of a funeral is to create precious last memories for the family and friends, why must the emphasis be on the death?  Wouldn’t the memories be cherished more if the funeral actively expressed the deceased’s life?

Today, funeral directors are encouraging grieving families to explore unique ways to celebrate the life of their loved one rather than to simply remind mourners that that person is no longer with them.  Getting “closure” is far more than paying last respects or actually viewing the body.  Genuine closure involves a personal interaction with the essence of who the deceased was.  With a greater emphasis on the joyful, poignant and funny moments in the deceased’s life, and, for those who believe, on their life after death, the tone of the funeral shifts from oppressive to heart-warming, from sad to hopeful.  The family and friends come away with a renewed sense of determination to integrate the memories of what their loved one stood for into their own futures.

This change is even reflected in the funeral home websites that grieving families are discovering online.  Just do a search for “funeral homes celebration,” and you will find that quite a few funeral directors have taken this new trend to heart, incorporating celebration in some way into every aspect of their funeral homes.

Although there will always be families that are more comfortable with traditional funerals, as funeral directors, you owe it to your clients and communities to offer a range of funeral style options, so that grieving families can decide how best to express the life of their loved one through the funeral arrangements.

As you offer resources to your families while they consider their options for creating a celebration funeral, a few books to suggest are:

Celebration of Life: A Ten-Step Planning Guide by Sarah Hamm,

Final Celebrations: A Guide for Personal and Family Funeral Planning by Kathleen Sublette and Martin Flagg, and

Planning a Celebration of Life, A Simple Guide for Turning a Memorial Service into a Celebration of Life.

 

Be sure to check out our Members page.

Exclusively for funeral homes, hospices and churches.