Funerals to Die For – That Won’t Cost The Earth
I am a member of Home Funeral Network and HFN hosted their first conference called Funerals to Die For- That Won’t Cost The Earth, this took place in Oxford on November 4th 2016. It was a day of informative talks, inspiring stories, good workshops and included a film. The speakers were Jerrigrace Lyons, Professor Tony Walters, Dr Ros Taylor MBE, Josefine Speyer, who was a founder member of The Natural Death Centre and Claire Turnham, and others. Dee Ryding, funeral director and celebrant, introduced the speakers and facilitated a Q & A session with a panel from members of the Home Funeral Network. The energy for the whole of the day was really buzzing and positive, it ran smoothly and the packed community centre was energised and people had a positive experience.
The morning and afternoon were scheduled with talks and presentations and during the 2 hour lunch break there were crafts workshops to participate in and the film ‘a family undertaking’ was shown. I’ll write a little about the most inspiring speakers for me, however the whole event was just lovely, informative and inspiring.
Dr Ros Taylor
Dr Ros Taylor MBE is the current National Director for Hospice Care. Her talk was called Immortality and all that jazz. She is a leading figure in the hospice and palliative care sector with more than 20 years experience of both providing and championing quality, person-centred care for terminally ill people and their families. she gave an dynamic talk… with sign posting to Jose Saramago book ‘Death at Intervals’, Steven cave’s book ‘Immortality’ and she recommended Sheldon Soloman’s You Tube clips… She spoke about one of the barriers to talking about funerals is death anxiety, that death and our fear of death affects our behaviour and she will asked patients what’s important to one if time is short? and the need to promote self esteem as an intervention.
Professor Tony Walter talk was titled Is the Funeral Industry fit for purpose?”
Tony Walter
Tony Walter is a sociologist who writes, lectures and consults on death and society, and tutors on a course for funeral celebrants. He is Honorary Professor of Death Studies at the University of Bath’s Centre for Death & Society of which he was the director from 2011-2015. I have seen Tony in action before at a CDAS conference, so I was looking forward to his talk…
for more information see: http://www.bath.ac.uk/sps/staff/tony-walter/
Tony’s talk was indeed the most inspiring and slightly controversial, he was saying that in the 19th century when people moved to new industrial towns, they did not know where they fitted in and often they bought the ‘hard ware’ as Tony put it, to demonstrate family status and respectability.. later in the 20 and 21st century many more people felt more secure in themselves and funerals became minimalism, then funerals became personal, mainly looking back, celebrating the life of the departed. He proposed that there are ‘hardware merchants’ and this structure needs to change and is unfit for purpose. Tony was suggesting that even the independent funeral directors need to be mindful that they dont fall into the business of selling the hard wear too, as he felt this was indeed the case. – he ended with saying that we should perhaps be contracting with the ceremonlist before the hardware merchants and to have the ceremony at the heart of things. He advocated for do it yourself funerals, and maybe an aspect of cutting the cost would be to side step the hardware merchants and take the body straight to the point of disposal and possibly approach crematoriums as the main contractor ? I liked his input and fully agree that cost must be lowered and others such as a ceremonalist/ death midwife could take the lead.
Claire & Jerrigrace
Jerrigrace Lyons, is a Founding Director of the educational non profit organisation, Final Passages, based in California and Internationally known as a pioneer and teacher in home funeral guidance and family-led death care services. Jerrigrace is a death midwife, minister, author and educator. Since 1995 she has supported hundreds of families with their family directed, home funerals.
Claire Turnham is the Oxford based Founder of Only with Love, who supports home and family led funerals and is Chair of the Home Funeral Network. She is dedicated to empowering and guiding families to tenderly take care of their own. Claire is recognised as a leading home funeral guide, independent celebrant and natural deathcare educator.
Claire and Jerrigrace talk was called Returning Death Care and Funerals Back Home, and they discussed the movement of home funerals – and the need for a modern term for people to connect with – the term ‘home funeral’ was decided upon..their talk was interesting and they included personal experiences of supporting families.
Above some pictures of some of the craft/ creative sessions, weaving , making lanterns and felting.
The focus of the day was for the general public to discover the choices available, to consider aspects of Home Funerals, to connect with professionals, and hear the stories of people who have found their own ways to say goodbye. It gave some practical guides to dealing with death, dying and bereavement, through a compassionate, informed, natural approach to deathcare, and for some introduced the idea of home funerals and the role of death midwives and celebrants. The day was a success, I enjoyed meeting new people and familiar faces and I am so looking forward to next year’s conference.
