A media release announcing the publication of For Those Who Believe: Life is Changed not Ended says the policy recognises the challenges and sensitivity required of those involved in pastoral care for the one who has died and those who mourn within the Catholic community.

• It respects cultural and family traditions.
• Recognition and value is given to the variety of ministers and ministries involved in funerals.
• The development of bereavement ministry in parishes is encouraged.
• Attention is paid to the different stages and rites that surround the death of a Christian and precede the 3-fold rite of Christian Burial - the Vigil, the Funeral Liturgy and the Rite of Committal.
• Consideration of Catholic practice around Cremation is provided.
• The purpose of Catholic funeral rites in relation to the use of Symbols, Words of Remembrance, Music and other forms of Tribute is clearly and simply stated.

Guidelines for Tangihana

In addition, the New Zealand Catholic Bishops recommend Tangihanga: A Catechesis, prepared by Rev Danny Karatea-Goddard which included in the publication.

The Bishops say "This catechesis gives clarity to the timing, process and various customs that may be engaged on the Tangihanga journey."

Helps bereavement ministers and funeral directors

The media release says that For Those Who Believe: Life is Changed not Ended will be "particularly useful for priests, deacons, chaplains and members of the Catholic community who share in any form of bereavement ministry, as well as funeral directors."

"Priests, deacons and catechists who may be asked to assist at a tangihanga or laity who may be participating as friends will also welcome the accessible and informative catechesis."

Source

Supplied - www.catholic.org.nz

In accordance with his and his family's wishes, his ashes were interred in an urn shaped like a large version of a Moka pot, the stovetop coffee maker he introduced to the world. Read more

A short video of the memorable funeral mass is here.

More inspections were ordered in villages following recent cases including a funeral in Hebei province where a woman was photographed removing her bra in front of children and images of the deceased.

"Illegal performances such as strip dances have been occurring in rural areas from time to time that have disrupted the cultural market and created a negative influence on the social environment," the Ministry of Culture said in a statement on its website. Continue reading

They say the dead don't care, but I'm not dead yet, so as long as I'm still alive, I'd like to have some say in what goes on at my funeral.

And, truth be told, I think the dead do care.

Not that they will be privy to the details of what happens at their own funerals, but they still care about the world, about their family, about the church. The saints in heaven continue to pray for those who are still on their earthly pilgrimage, so how could they not care about them?

Because I do care now, and will care even after I'm with the Lord, here are some things I hope and pray are not said at my funeral.

I care about those who will be there, about what they will hear.

I want the truth to be spoken, the truth about sin, the truth about death, and, above all, the truth about the love of God in Jesus Christ.

So, please don't say…

He was a good man

Don't turn my funeral into a celebration of my moral resume.

For one thing, I don't have one.

I'm guilty of far more immoral acts than moral ones.

Secondly, even if I were the male equivalent of Mother Teresa, don't eulogize me.

Talk about the goodness of the Spirit who calls, gathers, enlightens, sanctifies, and keeps us in the true faith.

Talk about our good Father who's made us all His children in baptism.

Talk about the good Husband that Christ is to His bride, the church. Don't say, "He was a good man," but "our good God loved this sinful man."

Chad…Chad…Chad

I don't want to be the focus of my own funeral.

I was not the center of the liturgy on Sunday mornings, so why should it be any different during my funeral liturgy?

If anyone's name comes up over and over, let it be the name that is above every name—Jesus.

He is the one who has conquered death. He is the one in whose arms I will have died. He is the one, the only one, who gives hope to the bereaved.

Let me decrease that Christ may increase.

God now has another angel

Heaven is not going to de-humanize me.

In fact, once I am resurrected on the last day, I will be more human than ever before, for my human soul and human body will finally be in a glorified state that's free of sin.

People don't become angels in heaven any more than they become gods or trees or puppies.

The creature we are now, we shall be forever.

God has enough angels already.

All He wants is more of His children in the place Jesus has prepared for them.

We are not here to mourn Chad's death, but to celebrate his life

So-called "Celebrations of Life" (which I have written against in "The Tragic Death of the Funeral") do a disservice to the mourners for they deny or euphemize death.

The gift of life cannot fully be embraced if we disregard the reality of death, along with sin, its ultimate cause.

Whatever the apparent reason for my decease may be—a sickness, accident, or old age—the real reason is because I was conceived and born in sin, and I built atop that sinful nature a mountain's worth of actual sins.

The only person's life to celebrate at a funeral is the Savior conceived of the virgin Mary, who became our sin on the cursed tree that we might become His righteousness in the blessed font, who buried sin and death in the empty tomb He left behind on Easter morning.

Chad would not want us to weep

When Lazarus died, Jesus wept.

Those tears betoken a God who's fully human, who experienced the sadness and grief we all do at the death of those we love.

To cry is not to deny that our friend or family member is with the Lord, but to acknowledge that in this vale of tears there is still death, still loss, still suffering.

I do want those who mourn my death to weep, not for my sake, but for their own, for it is an integral part of the healing process.

But while they weep, let them remember that in the new heavens and new earth, God "shall wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there shall no longer be any death; there shall no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain," (Revelation 21:4).

What's in that coffin is just the shell of Chad

What's in that coffin is the body that was fearfully and wonderfully made when our Father wove me together in my mother's womb (Psalm 139:13-14).

What's in that coffin is the body that Jesus baptized into His own body to make me part of Him.

What's in that coffin is the body that ate the saving body of Jesus, and drank His forgiving blood in the Supper, that I might consume the medicine of immortality.

And what's in that coffin is the body that, when the last trumpet shall sound, will burst from my grave as a body glorified and ready to be reunited with my soul.

My body is God's creation, an essential part of my identity as a human being. It is not a shell. It is God's gift to me. And one day I'll get it back, alive, restored, perfected to be like the resurrected body of Jesus.

Of course, there's always more that could be added to this list—and perhaps you'd like to add more in the comments below—but I believe these get the point across.

I want the beginning of my funeral to be focused on Jesus, as well as the middle, as well as the end, as well as every point in between.

I care about those who will attend. Let them hear the good news, especially in the context of this sobering reminder of mortality, that neither death, nor life, nor anything else in all creation, can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ, our Lord, for He is the resurrection and the life.

Source

• Chad Bird, Flying Scroll
• Used with permission Chad Bird @birdchadlouis
• Read more at "Christ Alone"

Chad Bird, from San Antonio TX is a husband, father, poet, runner, lover of Hebrew and the Hebrew Bible, and an active Christian of the Lutheran confession.