Different Cultures

Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday Ash Wednesday everyone. So if like me you’re still full from the pancakes yesterday you’re not alone! Shrove Tuesday or Pancake Day is when many countries with a Christian population celebrate. Traditionally you would empty your larder of all the goodies before you embarked upon Lent. You can see the almost literal translation in…

Story about Scattering of Ashes wins Irish short story competition

Story about Scattering Ashes Ashes by Claire Zwaartmann has won first prize in RTÉ Radio 1 Short Story Competition (RTE is the Republic of Ireland’s public broadcaster). The story is about a deceased mans children scattering his ashes in the bay. It centres around the son needing to collect the ashes, the choice of location…

Swaminarayan Hindu leaders want a special place for scattering ashes on the shores of Lake Windermere

Hindu Ashes Lake Windermere Lake Windermere is a special place to scatter ashes of a loved one. And it has become an important one for the members of the Swaminarayan sect. The sect is a rapidly growing branch of Hinduism which is popular in the western world. Why is Lake Windermere important for Hindus? Lake…

Have I been wrong about Resomation (water disposal of a body)

Burial and Cremation are the time-honoured ways to dispose of a body, since prehistoric times cultures have been either been burning or burying them (some have been leaving them on the top of mountains for the vultures- but let’s not go there). Well there is a new kid on the block – Alkane Hydrolysis body…

Splitting Ashes and the Church of England

The good old CofE don’t really like ashes to be split, and the Catholic Church specifically prohibits it. I was speaking at a resent Church of England conference on the subject of ashes and this thorny issue was raised. From a secular point of view I never realised the extent to which this vexed the…

Hindu Scattering Service on the Ganges in India

The Hindu population of the UK increases year on year, in the last census in 2011 817,000 people in England and Wales identified themselves as Hindus which is 1.5% of the population. A proportion of these would loved to have their ashes placed in the Ganges in India after their death. For some time we have…

South Korea has adopted cremation in a big way

In the 1994 20.5% of South Koreans chose cremation, this figure has shot up to 86% last year. A massive change in less than a generation. I have never known any county’s funeral practises to change as radically as quickly, in the UK the same change took three times as long a an we are…

The rise of unclaimed ashes in Japan

The issue of unclaimed ashes in Japan is becoming a problem for the local authorities. A trend mirroring the UK. Whilst there are cultural differences, many of the issues are similar to those in the UK: firstly the weakening of bonds within extended families and thus the willingness of extended family willing to pay; secondly…

The Vatican’s position on the ashes of saints

The Vatican has updated it rules on relics these are body parts (and more historically) including associated items of a saint. There has been issues recently when surviving family members disagree with what the Catholic church wishes to do body of a person once they have given saint status. The rules were last updated in…

Over 19 Million Thais offered sandalwood flowers for the king’s cremation

The offering of Sandalwood flower for cremation is Thailand is symbolic, after the Thai king’s death (Bhumibol Adulyadej) in May this year the new king organised a project so that the public could learn how to make these flowers so that they could present these flowers as an offering for at king’s cremation. The traditional…

Church of England rules on Exhumation of Ashes: what are Exceptional Circumstances

The Church of England considers the burial of ashes final. To get ashes removed from consecrated land is difficult if not impossible, you will need to demonstrate exceptional circumstances and navigate the very formal language used by the church. Set out below is what you need to know. You would need to get permission (known as…

Family appeal for someone out in New Zealand to scatter their grandma’s ashes

Olive Chesworth from Liverpool adored New Zealand and Maori culture. So much so she spent a large amount of time in antipodean climes. After her first visit in 1991 she saved up and spent six months there every other year. Now she passed away her family are looking to scatter some of her ashes on…

Unsightly deposit of cremated remains in Trinidad and Tobago

I hate having to admit my ignorance, but I never knew: the largest ethnic make-up of people in Trinidad and Tobago hail from the Indian Sub-continent. And with them they brought Hinduism and associate death rituals. Well it seems that where bodies are being cast into the waters of the river Caroni the site becoming…

Why I understand the Catholic Church’s stance on scattering ashes

There are a number of people and organisations that have been getting rather hot under the collar about the recent instruction from the Vatican clarifying the Catholic Church’s position on the scattering ashes and the fact that they do not like it, or splitting ashes, or jewellery containing ashes, so on and so forth. There are those who…

Vatican’s update stance regarding the burial of the deceased and the conservation of the ashes in the case of cremation for Roman Catholics

The Vatican has issued an Instruction to the faithful regarding the scattering of ashes. Whilst setting out of their position in many ways makes sense and it is clearly referenced, we will attempt to summarise and translate and convey the message in a slightly more condensed and accessible form. This is our interpretation and I…

Where west meets east: memorial reefs in Hawaii

Memorial reefs are well established in the US the most famous is arguably the Neptune Society: a fantastical underwater sea-scape set off the coast of Florida – clear blue warm seas, absolutely perfect. With those sort of climatic conditions where else in the States might be ideally suited, well Hawaii for one….? Now cast your gaze to the…

Mar Thoma Syrian Church – Cremation is now allowed

The various religions in the world is a constant source of wonder to me. The various sects seems never ending, here is a new one on me, the Mar Thoma Syrian Church – never heard of it? It has over a million followers. Although as religions go this fairly unique. It is a Syrian Christian…

Ash scattering in New Zealand and internet intolerance!

New Zealand has a particular problem. The majority of the population are British/European settlers and as with most of this element of Western culture they are moving towards increased secularisation and an increase in cremation. As a consequence more families are scattering the ashes of a loved one over the hills and lakes of this stunningly…

Exhumation granted to family of Chinese Buddhist

Good news for the family of Mr Quoc Tru Tran. They have been given permission to remove his body from Manchester’s Southern cemetery in Chorlton, have it cremated, so that they can have them reinterred next to his wife in the Buddhist temple in Old Trafford. The Church of England court that has jurisdiction over…

Metal fan has his ashes scattered in the Mosh Pit

You’re not allowed to call it heavy metal any more so I am told, just metal. But still to my mind it is pretty much the same. Loud in volume, lots of drums and thrash guitar, not so many ballads and plenty of counter culture paraphernalia. Metal bands seem to specifically go out of their…

Attitudes to ashes are changing in Germany

Germany, traditionally, has always been one of the strictest countries in Europe in relation to cremated remains. In most German states it is illegal to keep, bury or scatter ashes anywhere outside of cemetery, but attitudes are changing according to a recent survey. The survey of over 1000 people revealed that the vast majority of…

Grave robbing ashes in China – thieves demand a ransom!

After writing over 500 articles on the subject you would think the subject would yield little in the way of surprises, not true. Here is a new issue that I had not come across or to be honest even considered. In the Chinese city of Xinyang there has been a case of grave robbers removing ashes…

Ashes of thousands of unclaimed Japanese WWII civilian casualities

Japan has a legacy of thousands of set of unclaimed ashes that have remained stored in temples around the country since the end of WWII, despite the person being identified. The families of more than 7,400 people have yet to claim ashes stored in eight cities across Japan, many of these victims died in US…

The mystery of the ashes of the Indian nationalist Netaji

Subhas Chandra Bose, known more commonly as just Netaji is a famous figure in the Indian nationalist movement. During the second world war he pursued a number of routes to try and get the British out of Indian, first courting the Germans and then the Japanese however when his military campaign didn’t work, he decided…

The environmental cost of cremation in India

I would argue that the environmental impact of cremation is less than burial, there is a need to compare two issues which are difficult to equate – Carbon versus land-take. I think the land-take is a more significant issue. The argument is even more in favour of cremation if the energy source is renewable. However the…

Armenians are considering cremation, what don’t they like? Columbarium

Armenian parliament speaker Galust Sahakyan has been arguing in favour of amending the law to allow for cremation say it was part of a new Armenia. However we also pointed out that ‘no one is going to take steps opposed to Armenians ‘national traditions and interests.” Work needed to be done in relation to the…

Iconic Buddhist monk’s cremation relics go on display

The Rosemead Buddhist temple in Los Angles is opening its door to the public, displaying a huge collection of relics. This year the collection has even more artefacts, perhaps the most notable of its new relics from the Venerable Thich Quang Duc. The Buddhist monk who in 1963 in south Vietnam set fire to…

A festival that involves throwing cremation ash at one another

Varanasi, India is famous and unique. A holy Hindu city whose principal business is death, many families take their loved ones to be cremated there, while western eyes may view it as macabre, the locals have a very different take. Reincarnation is a fundamental part of the Hindu religion so moving from this life to…

Unclaimed dead in Los Angeles – a service for the interment of ashes

Every year the city of Los Angeles buries it’s unclaimed dead. In December 2014 those who deceased in 2011 were laid to rest. Nothing unusual in that, all municipalities have such arrangements. What is interesting is the numbers involved. In 2011 the city cremated over 1,800 bodies, these were people where no next of kin…

Bremen is the first state in Germany to allow the scattering of ashes

Bremen, the smallest state in Germany, has voted to allow the scattering of ashes. To be honest I knew the name, but I was not aware where it was – and it is small, really small in fact it is two cities that are separated by the larger state of Lower Saxony. You might…

Japanese fake ash scattering tourism

Before starting this blog I never thought I would write that as a sentence and even since I still think it is different. Japanese are now taking more funeral planning into their own hands, rather than leaving for relatives to sort. Nothing odd in that the trend is happening elsewhere too, the elderly have…

Cremation beads an idea from South Korea

Times are changing in South Korea and cremation is on the rise, space and cost being two of the main factors. And so are traditions in the way people are memorialising. One option is to have the cremation ashes turned into beads. I quite like this idea. Instead of an urn filled with ashes…

Why is so difficult to cremate someone in Greece?

In 2006 the Greek parliament laid a law allowing cremation, yet to date no one has been cremated. Greece suffers a problem, like many countries, their urban cemeteries are overcrowded, it is not uncommon for a body to be exhumed moved after three year to make space for someone else. So one might think that…

The changing face of municipal memorialsation

It would seem councils are waking up to the fact that people are general cremated and now that people no longer scatter their loved ones ashes at the crematoria that they may have changing role in relation to public memorialisation. I came across this from Kelso in Scotland. A councillor has been petitioning Scottish…

Tibetan Buddhist thinking may not favour water burials for ashes

I have often thought that the more you read the less you really know, this I often feel when considering the stances of the various world religions and subdivisions thereof. Tibetan Bhuddiam has a slightly different take on many aspects of doctrine compared to other forms of Buddhism. Mr Khenpo Karma Tharchin Rinpoche, a senior lama of…

Make your own ashes: Japanese bone crushing apparatus for rent

Now here’s a franchise opportunity you are unlikely to see on Dragons Den: Rental of bone crushing apparatus. The Japanese tradition is to cremate and then place the bones of the loved one in an urn, I have already posted on this – Japanese cremation. Normally what happens is for the urn to be…

The Balinese ceremony of Ngaben: Turn to Ash

The beautiful Island of Bali in the Indonesian archipelago has a predominately Hindu population, whose belief system varies slightly from the Hindu doctrine in India. And from time to time they hold mass cremations. The cremation ceremony know as Ngaben (which means ‘turn to ash’) is elaborate and expensive and if a family can’t afford…

Japanese Buddhist temples criticised for interring ashes sent through the post

Japan is a predominantly secular country although nominally a third (about 90 million people) follow the Buddhist tradition. Now a small number of temples are offering a postal service accepting cremation ashes through the post, which the priests then inter at the charnel house. This has come under some criticism. The reason given is…

New Zealands Hindu’s and Maori’s a clash of ash culture

The scattering of cremation ashes in New Zealand is becoming more contentious as time goes by. Why? Well the reason I believe is because of two main factors, the general rise cremation and scattering as an option, but also the rise in in the number of Hindus in the country, which according to Wikipedia’s…

We don’t want the ashes back

I am always keeping an eye out for news stories and when I started posting I would say every week there is a story about some cerebrally challenged crook who mistakenly pinches an urn and the family are pleading for it back (often with happy endings I am delighted to say), then there are…

Respecting the ashes of a flag: a ceremony for retiring ceremonial colours in the US

On the blog we discuss many aspects of the cremation ashes ceremony including the dignity and the meaning. This is a story that comes from Richmond, Kentucky USA and it sparked my thinking on logical extensions from memorialising human ashes to that of a nations symbols – The flags of state and it’s institutions. Before…

Japanese Emperor and Empress choose cremation

The Japanese emperor and empress plan to break from tradition when they die and have chosen to be cremated (burial has been the norm for recent generations) and to have a more modest mausoleum than their ancestors. This is a big deal in Japan, the Japanese tend to by fairly conservative (sorry for the sweeping…

Scattering Ashes biblical reference Psalm 147:16 – Origins Part IV

Psalm 147:16 Here is how it is written in the King James Bible: He giveth snow like wool: he scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes. Firstly, in no way do I express to be a translator of the Bible. So sorry to those of you that are, please don’t mind my thoughts they designed not…

A fairway farewell? The golfer’s dilemma

Are you a golfer or was your loved one a golfer? Are you thinking of scattering your/their ashes on a golf course? If the answer is yes to these questions then read on. I found an excellent article by a chap named Mark Donavan who has considered the angle very thoroughly from a golfer’s…

New law set to allow cremation in Lagos State, Nigeria

Now this doesn’t sound all that controversial right? I mean they have crematoria in the Gulf States, so it is no big deal right? Wrong. The following is based on a an article on the All Africa website I have provided a link at the bottom. In Nigeria, Lagos State will be the first…

Japanese cremation ashes rituals: Kotsuage and Bunkotsu

Japanese culture around the collection and burial of cremation ashes is highly ritualised. Shinotism, a ‘religion’ closely associated with Buddhism is observed in Japan and ancestral worship is central to this. The funeral ritual has twenty stages and there are over 20 procedures, we are mainly interested in two of these: Kotsuage which is…

Keeping ashes in a Columbarium: what are they, why use them and what do they cost.

A columbarium is a wall with cavities designed to hold cremation urns or cinerary urns. Have look at the picture above, they are usually made of stone such as granite and each niche can hold a number of cremation urns (up to about 4). The niche faceplate usually has an inscription engraved upon it.…

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