Funerals

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An Informative Consumer Guide

Funerals are ceremonies marking a person’s death. Customary funerals comprise a combination of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember the dead. The procedures and practices of funerals vary widely among cultures and among religious affiliations within cultures.  In North America, funerals are typically divided into three parts.

The first part of most funerals is known as the visitation. At some funerals this is also called a “viewing” or a “wake.” In this part of funerals, the body of the deceased is placed on public display in a funeral casket, and the public is invited to walk by to pay final, individual, respects to the deceased. One of history’s most famous viewings occurred at the funeral of Pope John Paul VI in 2005. At this viewing, nearly 100,000 mourners filed slowly by the pope’s casket over the course of a few days before the funeral. Viewings traditionally occur at least one or two days before most funerals and they can last up until the start of the memorial service, the next part of most North American funerals.

The memorial service of most funerals in North America can vary greatly according to the personality of the deceased, the wishes of the deceased’s family members, and any number of other factors. In general, this portion of most funerals includes musical performances, religious messages from a pastor, and remarks from the deceased’s family and friends.

The final part of most North American funerals is known as the internment. This part of most funerals follows a police escorted trip from the site of the memorial service to the deceased’s final resting place, usually a cemetery. At the cemetery, a pastor typically delivers some final religious messages, and the body’s funeral casket is placed on a temporary platform above its grave. Once the pastor’s internment message is complete, family members typically comfort one another for a short period, and that’s when most funerals end. After the family has left the cemetery the temporary platform is removed, and the casket is lowered into its grave.

This is the typical traditions followed at most funerals in North America, but there can be a great number of variations, especially in cases in which the deceased’s body is cremated. In these funerals, it’s not uncommon for the visitation and the internment to be modified or skipped entirely.

A fourth, informal, part of many North American funerals has taken root in the last few years. Known formally as the funeral luncheon, many families gather at a family member’s home for a few hours of socializing and food, during which the deceased is remembered as a fun-loving, playful spirit who was an important part of many people’s lives.

In general, funerals are as old as the human race itself. According to some sources, in the Shanidar cave in Iraq, Neanderthal skeletons have been discovered with a characteristic layer of pollen, which suggests that Neanderthals buried the dead with gifts of flowers. Flowers, of course, are also on prominent display at most North American funerals, so their discovery on ancient burial sites indicates that at least that tradition has been a part of funerals for as long as man has been on Earth.