Funeral Rituals In The Christian Community

By Hannah Chen | November 16, 2009

A funeral is a family (or a State) service held in honour of a dead person. It entails a series of rites and customs that change in accordance with the deceased’s religion and culture.

A majority of Christian funerals have ceremonies that can be categorized into three types of events – visitation, funeral and burial. The visitation and funeral ceremonies have greater importance from the point of view of rituals and have been detailed here.

The first and foremost part is visitation wherein the body is laid in a casket for friends and relatives to see and bid their final adieu to the departed. The body is often adorned with the best clothes and jewels belonging to the deceased. Some communities follow the rite of anointing the body, though not all communities are bound to do it.

Some families prefer displaying memories from the life of the dead person at visitation in the form of pictures and personal articles that were prized belongings of the dead person. Some people also play a video or run a slideshow from the lifetime of the deceased.

This ceremony is then followed by the funeral ceremony, which is essentially a memorial service that is usually held at the church. The casket containing the dead body is placed in a hearse and carried to the church with a funeral cortege of mourners, who accompany the carriage. The coffin with its floral arrangement is then housed in the church.

This involves offering of prayers by the attendees and reciting lines from the Bible or other sacred texts by the clergy. The mourning groups also sing religious songs in chorus. Then the presiding pastor gives a speech, which is closely followed by tributes given by the family members and friends of the departed elaborating upon the life, achievements and good qualities of the deceased. Quite often, the people gathered are permitted to see the dead body for one last time before it is taken for burial. The service is sometimes also followed by ringing church bells.

Once the first two parts of the ceremony are complete, the body is taken into a vehicle for burial that forms the third part of the rituals.

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