Sunday quiet. Did you go to Church?

@MaryJo1996 I don't either. A nearby church has closed down and another holds services once a month, rotating with three other churches. That seems to be getting more common.

@Lynda70 Threats from (self-styled) "Christians" - and as recently as the 1990s... That's awful!

Not only secular funeral rites now but also "direct cremations" in which the mourners may gather in the crematorium garden to see the cortege, but must not enter the chapel.

One thing that struck me about that secular funeral I attended recently was that unlike others I'd been to, there was no committal with a ceremonial closing of the curtain. Instead, the coffin stayed on the catafalque so everyone could say a brief personal good-bye as we filed past and out into the gardens.

While at two other crematoria I recall no closing of curtains round between stationary catafalque and congregation, but the catafalque carrying the deceased through the curtains beyond it - a sort of mechanical "exit stage right".


I did see a video of the Pagan funeral, of an old friend. It was also a "Woodland Burial".

@ArishMell The coffin was left on the catafalque at a funeral I attended last year. At another I attended "Time to say Goodbye" (Bocelli & Brightman) was played as the curtains were closing. They got to the words "Time to say goodbye" just as the curtains closed.

@Lynda70
Rather touching, that.

I heard recently of one similar do in which the music was a Metallica track, and "Always Look On The Bright Side" from The Life of Brian!

I was told the deceased had that sort of humour....