Death is part of the cycle of life. All the same, when a person very dear to us dies, we are still overcome with grief and brokenheartedness. A relinquishing rite should be done. Funeral services are rites that allow people to relinquish and achieve closure.
A funeral is a family (or a State) ceremony conducted to honour a deceased person. It entails many customs and rites that are unique to the religion of the dead person.
Most Christian funerals have rites that are divided into three essential parts – visitation, funeral and finally, the burial. The first two parts, which are the most important ones as far as rites and rituals are concerned, are discussed below.
The first and foremost part is visitation wherein the body is laid in a casket for family and friends to see and pay their last respects to the departed. The body is dressed in the finest clothes and adorned with jewelery. Some cultures require embalming the deceased for the visitation, while others don’t.
At the visitation, family members may also exhibit photographs taken of the deceased while he was alive, or some valuable possessions that were very dear to the deceased. Some relatives also run a slideshow or video from the lifetime of the deceased.
The visitation ceremony is followed by the next service, which is the memorial service, also known as funeral, and it is carried out in a church. The coffin containing the dead body is put in a vehicle and carried to the church along with a group of mourners, who follow the carriage. Then the casket is carried with its floral arrangement and housed in the church.
This entails offering of prayers by the attendees and reciting lines from the Bible or Holy Scriptures by the clergy. The people attending the funeral also sing religious songs. Then the presiding pastor gives a speech, which is then followed by tributes given by the family and relatives of the deceased who reflect upon the life, achievements and good qualities of the dead person. Sometimes, mourners are allowed to see the body for the last time before it is taken for burial. The service is sometimes also followed by ringing church bells.
The completion of second part, which is the funeral, marks the beginning of the burial, which is the final stage of the proceedings, and the deceased’s body is carried through a funeral cortege.
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