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Working in the funeral home business is one of those types of jobs that people don’t think about very much… until they have to. When a loved one passes, they must then confront a reality that exists for every human being. Fortunately, there are people like Joshua Meyer and Kenton LeBlanc ready to help guide a family through an emotionally difficult time. “In a way, it's a calling,” Meyer said. “I kind of liken it to someone becoming a minister. It’s the type of job not a lot of people consider, but for some of us it becomes a passion...

A coconut that was placed inside a coffin "sent fear" through staff at a crematorium when it exploded. Bolton Council has urged mourners to abide by crematorium rules and not "slip" items into coffins. Donna Ball, Assistant Director of Community Services, said a "hell of an explosion can sometimes occur". Other items of concern include mobile phones, TV remotes, e-cigarettes and bottles of alcohol. Ms Ball told the BBC: "We are asking people to be considerate regarding the items they place into coffins before the cremation process. "We have seen a rise in things like e-cigarettes, bottles of whisky and...

What do you want done with your body after you die? It is an unnerving but important question, and for most Americans there have long been only two obvious choices: burial or cremation. But a third option, a liquefaction process called by a variety of names — flameless cremation, green cremation or the “Fire to Water” method — is starting to gain popularity throughout the United States. This week, California became the 15th state to outline commercial regulations for the disposal of human remains through the method, chemically known as alkaline hydrolysis. It may seem markedly different from the traditional...

Recent Vatican Guidelines on Cremation, Though Helpful, Require Follow-up Msgr. Charles Pope • November 7, 2016 • I was happy to hear that the Vatican recently reminded the world’s Catholics of some important matters concerning cremation. As cremation has become more common in recent decades, many significant problems have emerged. Cremated remains not being buried or placed in a mausoleum,Cremated remains being scattered,Cremated remains being divvied up among relatives,And strangest of all, cremated remains being fashioned into or incorporated within jewelry. Cremated remains should be treated with the same respect and reverence as bodily remains. For indeed cremated remains...

For decades, most people arranging a funeral have faced a simple choice - burial or cremation? But in parts of the US and Canada a third option is now available - dissolving bodies in an alkaline solution. It will arrive in the UK soon. Its technical name is alkaline hydrolysis, but it is being marketed as “green cremation”. So long, Robert Klink Robert J Klink spent his life near water. When he was growing up in the 1950s, his parents had a cabin on South Long Lake, in Minnesota, the land of 10,000 lakes. He learned to fish and hunt...

CINCINNATI -- A "freak accident" started an unscheduled fire Wednesday night at the Hillside Chapel Crematory in Cincinnati, owner Don Catchen said. "My operator was in the process of cremating remains and (the body) was overly obese and apparently it got a little hotter than the unit is supposed to get," Catchen said. "One of the cremation containers that we had close got caught on fire and that's what burnt."

The Satanic Temple released a statement Saturday challenging new rules proposed by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott which require aborted babies to be cremated or buried and go into effect Dec. 19th. The Satanic Temple called burial rites a “well-established component of religious practice” and said their members believe in “the inviolability of the body,” concluding that “as such these rules contradict our fundamental beliefs.” The Satanists invoked their First Amendment “right to practice our beliefs,” adding that “under the Religious Freedom Reform Act (RFRA), the State must present a compelling reason for why they want to enforce rules that inhibit...

>>... the conservation of the ashes of the departed in a domestic residence is not permitted. Only in grave and exceptional cases dependent on cultural conditions of a localized nature, may the Ordinary, in agreement with the Episcopal Conference or the Synod of Bishops of the Oriental Churches, concede permission for the conservation of the ashes of the departed in a domestic residence. Nonetheless, the ashes may not be divided among various family members and due respect must be maintained regarding the circumstances of such a conservation.<< This permission should be seen in the context of the contemporary situation of...

TOKYO (Reuters) - Tucked away in a quiet residential street in Kawasaki city in Japan is a refurbished workshop with a plain silver exterior and black draped windows that residents describe as creepy. The business inside, Sousou, is one of Japan's latest so-called corpse hotels, a camouflaged morgue used to store some of Japan's mounting pile of bodies waiting for a spot in one of the nation's overworked crematoriums. “Crematories need to be built, but there isn’t any space to do so and that is creating funeral refugees," said Hisao Takegishi, who opened the business in 2014. At a daily...

Athens, January 21, 2016 Hierarchs of the Church of Greece have commented on the decision of local authorities to open a crematorium in the city of Patras, reports AgionOros. Bishop Chrysanthos stressed that "the war against the Church is now being waged openly. Cremation and other manifestations of the new morality (for example, "free cohabitation", civil partnerships and so on) have nothing to do with the Orthodox tradition of Greece". *** Metropolitan Justin of Kalamaria, commenting on the decision to open the crematorium, said: "Many claim that the Church should care for people's souls only and leave the body alone....

The 25-year-old Texan died after a long bout with cystic fibrosis. Her funeral was August 15 at the Mission Park Funeral Chapels North. “There wasn’t any forced entry to the facility,” Sgt. Javier Salazar told CNN affiliate KSAT. “So what it’s believed is between the hours of 1:30 p.m., when the service ended, to about 4:30 p.m., when they locked up for the evening, someone came in and stole Ms. Mott’s remains. That person remains at large.” Funeral home owner Dick Tips told the affiliate that he believes the body may have been stolen by someone who didn’t support Mott’s...

<p>A Civil War-era soldier who received the Medal of Honor will be buried with full military honors after his ashes were discovered in an unmarked, communal crypt.</p> <p>Sgt. Charles Schroeter will be buried at Miramar National Center in July, nearly a century after he died, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports.</p>

Considering Cremation? A Reflection on the Reverent Interment of Cremated Human Remains By: Msgr. Charles PopeI have written off and on about some of the problems that are setting up around cremation. Of course there has been very little explicit teaching or information available to Catholics to help them to frame their thinking. To assist modestly in that refelction I wrote the following flyer for my own parish. What follows is the text of that flyer. In case you are interested, I provide it in PDF format here: Considering Cremation?Some years ago, the Church gave wider permission for cremation and also lifted traditional...

Concerns about Cremation: Some Very Strange Practices Are Emerging By: Msgr. Charles PopeSome years ago, the Church gave wider permission for cremation and also lifted traditional restrictions on having cremated remains present in the church for funeral Masses. All of this is pastorally understandable. Very few if any people these days choose cremation for the reasons it had traditionally been forbidden, namely as a denial of the resurrection of the body. Generally the reasons chosen are economic, due to the increasingly high cost of traditional burial and the difficulty, especially in urban areas, of finding room for large cemeteries. The basic norms from the church...

Washington State abortion clinic chain advertises that they offer women bereavement resources and services and grief counseling. What exactly would a woman grieve after having an abortion? Perhaps a baby? Cedar River abortions clinics have locations in Seattle, Renton, and Tacoma Washington. According to their website, Cedar River Clinics, is operated by the Feminist Women’s Health Center (FWHC), which was founded in Yakima in 1979. The Renton and Tacoma centers were added when their physician-owners and the name Cedar River Clinics was adopted. The Renton center was purchased in 1991 when abortionist Baird Bardarson retired. In 2014, FWHC acquired Aurora...

Greek archaeologists discover rare example of 2,700-year-old weaving The Associated PressPublished: May 9, 2007 ATHENS, Greece: Archaeologists in Greece have recovered a rare section of 2,700-year old fabric from a burial imitating heroes' funerals described by the poet Homer, officials said Wednesday. The yellowed, brittle material was found in a copper urn during a rescue excavation in the southern town of Argos, a Culture Ministry announcement said. "This is an extremely rare find, as fabric is an organic material which decomposes very easily," said archaeologist Alkistis Papadimitriou, who headed the dig. She said only a handful of such artifacts have...

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP) -- Cremation may be the new American response to death, according to a survey by LifeWay Research. The study, which surveyed 1,036 Americans, shows that about 4 in 10 (41 percent) say they plan to be cremated. Six in ten (58 percent) say being cremated won't keep you from being resurrected to live in heaven. And few (14 percent) say cremation is wrong. The LifeWay online survey reflects the growing acceptance of cremation, which has become common in the United States. About 4 in 9 (43.5 percent) Americans who died in 2012 were cremated, according to the...

We live in a culture where, increasingly, any sense of the sacred is being lost. The thought that something could be sacred, special, holy, or somehow “off-limits” is bewildering to many. Indeed many secularists consider those who do see some things as sacred, to be stuffy and somehow arrogant. There are many in our culture who defend the rights of others to burn the flag, ridicule religious symbols (e.g. the cross submerged in urine some years back in a noted “art” museum), and even applaud when, a couple years back, homosexual activists desecrated the Body of Christ by stomping on...

It is no surprise to learn that, as land values continue to rise, space for cemeteries gets scarce. I have seen more and more mausoleums be built at the local cemeteries, and they are getting taller as the years go on. But the picture to the right really takes the concept to new heights! The picture is The Memorial Necrópole Ecumênica III, a vertical cemetery in Santos, Brazil. It is the world’s tallest cemetery, with burial spaces on 32 floors. There’s also a restaurant, chapel, lagoon and peacock garden. It has become one of the most popular tourist attractions in...

<p>AMELIA, Ohio (AP) — An Ohio woman who found her teenage son's cremated remains in a plastic shopping bag inside an urn is talking about how she's upset with the Kentucky funeral home that handled the ashes.</p> <p>Nancy Bronner, of Amelia in southwestern Ohio, said she was disgusted to open her son's urn after his death last September only to find his ashes tied up in a Wal-Mart bag.</p>