Funerals not a cause for celebration

SKY News presenter Colin Brazier asked people not to wear bright colours when they attended his wife’s funeral recently. He told mourners to “leave their Hawaiian shirts and pink helium balloons at home. Black please, if you don’t mind”.

Neither does he like the modern way of describing a funeral as a “celebration of someone’s life”. He said that it’s difficult for children to understand that such a sad event can be a celebration.

And as for eulogies: when the bereaved stand up and say a few words. A no to that as well. He would rather leave the summing up to a professional. Under pressure to “say something” he wrote: “I tried arguing that such a contribution would risk self-indulgent prating, even if I could hold it together, which in my case I doubt.”

Good for him. We’re squeamish about death and unwilling to be honest about what a funeral means. Hence the euphemism of it being a “celebration”.

Everything must have been so much easier when we weren’t so coy and when there were proprieties to observe. There are no rules now so at most funerals you see mourners hedging their bets, not going for head-to-toe black but opting for something meek and muddy so as not to stand out. You don’t want to look like the chief mourner if you’re not but neither do you want to bring an unseemly gaiety to the occasion.

Colin Brazier was right to set his ground rules. My sympathies to him for his loss.