The National Funeral Directors’ Association (NFDA) projects that in 2020 cremation will be the chosen form of disposition in over 56% of all cases*. By 2040, the NFDA projects in the same report that 3 out of every 4 people who pass away will be cremated.
More and more families are choosing cremation. Professionally, funeral directors have many theories as to why this trend has grown. Some claim that unskilled embalmers are to blame. Some funeral directors blame a breakdown of traditional values and young people’s tendency to seek less rigid forms of religious practice. Theories like these miss the mark and frame a family’s choice to cremate their loved one as a failure rather than as an opportunity to provide service to a family in need.
Families actually choose cremation for a variety of reasons, and these reasons are as personal as the relationships they have with their deceased loved ones. Cremation has advantages that traditional burial does not, such as flexibility regarding time-lines for planning services and more freedom in regards to the final resting place of cremated remains. For families that are environmentally minded, the fact that burial of cremated remains utilizes less space may be a driving factor in their choice. For many families the costs associated with cremation in comparison to traditional burial is a dominant factor in their decision.
Regardless of why a family has chosen cremation, there are still many decisions that must be made. This guide is intended to help families navigate their options regarding funeralization when cremation is chosen.
Frequently, I speak with people who are seeking pricing information on “simple cremation,” and many of these callers are surprised to learn that the services they think they are seeking are rather complex after all.
Direct Cremation
Direct cremation, also called simple cremation or no-frills cremation, means that the funeral home is not involved in planning or facilitating funeral or memorial ceremonies. Kuhn Funeral Home includes in our price for direct cremation the initial transfer of a decedent into our care from the place of death; a time for viewing the bodily remains for the purposes of identification prior to the cremation; transportation to our privately-owned crematory located in nearby Temple, Pennsylvania; the cost of the cremation and alternative container used in the cremation process; and the basic services of our staff, which includes a face-to-face arrangement with one of our knowledgeable and experienced staff.
Many people I speak with express that they are looking for cost-effective options. Services like onlinecremations.com offer discounted cremations, but in order to discount the service so heavily, personal meetings with staff are not included in the discounted price. Families complete an online order, a removal specialist dispatches to place of death to bring the bodily remains in the facility, and cremation is carried out. Legal documents such as the death certificate and cremation authorization are filed, but services like onlinecremations.com do not file any other benefit requests on behalf of the family.
Utilizing Kuhn Funeral Homes means that families have a partner to help them navigate the murky and at times confusing process of attending to a loved one’s affairs. Not only do the staff of Kuhn Funeral Home file the paperwork necessary for the cremation, but the staff also assist families file claims for other benefits for which they are entitled. The staff of the funeral home also help families arrange for what happens once the cremation has been carried out.
Traditional cremations
When choosing cremation, many people are not aware that they still have the choice as to whether or not they wish to have a public viewing where their loved one can be seen laid peacefully in the funeral home chapel (or church or other location). When a public viewing of the bodily remains precedes a cremation, this type of service is referred to as traditional cremation.
For these services, Kuhn Funeral Homes works with families to plan visitations and memorial services for their loved ones. When the bodily remains are brought into the funeral home’s care, the remains are embalmed with the family’s permission. The staff then dresses the remains according to the instructions of the family. The remains are then typically placed in a casket for viewing.
For the safety of both the human remains and the funeral home staff, the bodily remains must go into a rigid container of some kind. It is important to know that the Federal Trade Commission forbids any funeral home from claiming that a family must purchase a casket in order for their loved one to be cremated. Caskets are not a requirement of cremation. Typically an alternative container made of very thick cardboard is used.
For traditional cremations, a family has a few options as to what vessel in which they wish to view their loved one. Kuhn Funeral Homes has three vessels referred to as “rental caskets.” This means that instead of purchasing a casket, a family may “rent” a casket that has been fitted with a removable liner. The liner, serving as a container for cremation, is removed and cremated with the bodily remains of their loved one. A new liner is used for every service.
If a family is opposed to using the rental casket, they still have the option of purchasing an individual vessel that will be used for their loved one’s cremation. Kuhn Funeral Home has several caskets available that are specifically designed for cremation. A cremation casket is a casket that is light-weight and designed to quickly be consumed by the high heat of the crematory while leaving very little residue. Because these caskets are not designed to be as durable as caskets used in traditional burial, cremation caskets are not as expensive compared to other caskets.
Memorial Services or Celebrations of Life
Many families want to have a formal service for their loved ones, but they do not want to have the bodily remains of their loved ones present. When a viewing does not take place, the subsequent service is referred to as a memorial service.
Contemporary trends view funerals as sad affairs, and rather than being mournful, many families prefer to celebrate the life of their loved one.
During these ceremonies, the family may elect to have the cremated remains present inside of a urn, or they may elect to have a photo of their loved one as the central focus instead. Some families elect to have both present. Many families elect to have objects that were meaningful to the loved one present in the chapel or other venue.
A memorial service or celebration of life can be scheduled without the time constraints posed by traditional burial. If the family does not wish to have the cremated remains present for the service, the service does not even need to wait for a cremation to have been completed. Of all the services a family may choose, memorial services and celebrations of life have the most flexibility.
So the Cremation has been completed...now what?
Making the decision for cremation is hard enough, but families need to consider what is going to happen to the cremated remains once the cremation has been performed. Many families do not know what to do with the cremated remains, so they just take them home...and then for various reasons, do not make more permanent arrangements.
All too often we see articles online about people discovering abandoned cremated remains in the strangest of places. Goodwill reports that they receive an urn containing cremated remains about once a year, usually as part of a donation of goods from an estate settlement.** There is nothing wrong with bringing a loved one’s cremated remains home, but consideration must be made for what will happen to the cremated remains in the long term.
One option is burial. Plots for cremation burial are often significantly less costly than plots for traditional casketed burial, and the charges associated with opening and closing the graves are also less. Some cemeteries do require the use of an urn vault in order to protect the ground from sinking or to protect the urn from breaking due to the weight of the earth. Many cemeteries allow the use of a McKenzie style urn, which is a urn designed to functions both as a vessel to contain cremated remains and as an urn vault to withstand the weight of the earth.
Another option is entombment of cremated remains in a mausoleum or columbarium. Provided the selected urn fits into a niche space, there are less restrictions on what kind of urn a family must select. Some cemeteries feature glass-front niches that allow the urn and other keepsakes to be viewed by visiting family members.
Some families decide that they wish to lovingly scatter the cremated remains of their loved one in a place that is meaningful. For some families that place is a treasured garden; for other families the location is a favorite hunting camp. Some states have stricter requirements than others. Pennsylvania does not have any laws restricting where people may scatter cremated remains, though it is best practice to seek the permission of a property owner before scattering cremated remains on private property. The Clean Water Act does place some limitations on scattering cremated remains at sea. See https://www.epa.gov/ocean-dumping/burial-sea for more information.
(Please note that scattering cremated remains at theme parks is not a good idea. Disney routinely experiences park guests attempt to smuggle cremated remains into the parks. Guests who are caught in the act are escorted out of the park; remains that are scattered in Disney World and DisneyLand are vacuumed up and discarded in the trash.*** No one wants their loved one to be thrown in the trash.)
The options for urns to hold cremated remains are endless. Many suppliers offer options to personalize urns. Some urns can be engraved with a person’s name. Some urns may have an image laser-etched onto the surface. Almost any vessel can be an urn. I once worked with a family who decided to place the cremated remains of their mother inside of her favorite cookie jar. They plan to place that cookie jar inside their father’s casket when he also passes.
Cremated remains can be divided into several portions should multiple members of a family desire to have some of their loved one. There are endless possibilities as to what may be done with those cremated remains. They may be placed in a keepsake, used as part of a blown-glass art piece, added to ink for a tattoo… If someone can think of it, I would be willing to bet someone out there has done it. It is even possible to have cremated remains mixed with the gunpowder used for hunting ammunition. No matter what interest or hobby a loved one held, an appropriate keepsake can be produced.
In Summary
A family choosing cremation still has many options and many decisions to make. When choosing cremation, a family still must make decisions about how to appropriately and meaningfully memorialize their loved one. The resulting services are as unique as the life being celebrated.
Sources