After my brother died, I realized that I really wanted to become more religious to feel closer to him. I started going back to church and focusing on healthier living, and it felt like someone opened a window in my life. All of the sudden, I was able to experience a profound level of happiness and security that I had never felt before, and it was really incredible. I realized that religion was real and that it really made a difference, and I absolutely loved it. This blog is here to help other people who might have fallen away from religion to recognize its potential power in your life.
If your family is environmentally conscious, then planning a green funeral service can be a great step for remembering your loved one. Here are some steps to take when planning an ecologically conscious funeral service.
Speak with Your Funeral Director
The first thing to do is state your intentions to your funeral director. They may already have some great ideas on how to use their facilities for the most green funeral service possible. They may also be able to point you to some vendors that offer sustainably made or recycled funeral ware.
Use Recycled Programs
The paper programs are one item that's not very sustainable, but using recycled paper can help to cut down on the waste. You could also create an electronic version of your program and encourage people to use that, or encourage them to share programs.
Arrange for Sustainable Flowers
There are often a lot of flowers purchased for a funeral, both the ones you use to decorate the funeral home and the ones that family and friends send to your home. You can cut down on a lot of extra energy by making sure that all of these flowers are purchased from sustainable, local growers. This will cut down on the transportation that comes into play when you purchase fresh flowers from a long-distance supplier.
Make Carpooling Arrangements
This will take a little bit of work on your part to arrange, but it can be worth it to save on the extra gasoline. If you can help to facilitate carpools from place to place during the funeral, it will also streamline the process of getting everyone in the same place together and finding parking for enough vehicles.
Arrange Green Meals
Another area where you can make the funeral more sustainable is in the meals you serve. First, you can arrange to have locally-sourced food served at the reception. And you might even get people to bring their own plates, or have enough volunteers to bring silverware to share, so that you can reduce the need to buy disposable items for your funeral service.
In short, it just takes a little bit of planning to greatly reduce the amount of waste in your funeral service. It helps to walk through the entire ceremony with a funeral director, like one from Louis Suburban Chapel Inc., and pinpoint areas where a lot of resources are being used, and see if there's a workaround to become more sustainable.
Share21 June 2016
