FAMILIES FIND PEACE IN CREMATION
Witnessing ceremony offers a feeling of closure and calm for loved ones
When
George Fairclough entered the bright and airy cremation room at Thornton Cremation Centre in Oshawa, he felt it was a fitting venue to say goodbye to his wife, Teresa. Decorated in a soothing yellow, the room has paintings on the wall, an oval coffee table and comfortable chairs to sit in.
In this calming atmosphere, Fairclough watched the doors close behind his wife’s coffin as it entered the cremation chamber — a process referred to as “witnessing.”
“It meant so much,” he says. “It provides absolute closure and it was the last part of Teresa’s journey.”
To this day, many cremation facilities do not provide such a spot for a final send off, according to Rick Cowan, assistant vice-president of marketing and communications for Mount Pleasant Group (MPG), which operates 10 cemeteries, nine funeral centres and four cremation centres (including Thornton) across the GTA.
“Most facilities today have cremators that are very industrial looking,” Cowan says. “They’re housed in bare-bones rooms located away from any of the public facilities. The first time I saw one, it reminded me of the boiler room at school when I was a youngster.” Such rooms fulfill their purpose, “but that would not be the visual that I would want imprinted in my mind as my last memory of my loved one.”
Death, adds Cowan, has traditionally been wrapped in rituals that offer meaning and comfort to those left behind. And much as some families hold a graveside burial service to say a final farewell to their loved one, those who choose cremation often yearn for a quiet, comfortable space to say their final farewell.
That’s why in 2014, when MPG began replacing the cremation equipment at its four crematoriums with zero-greenhouse gas emission, state-of-the-art, European designed cremators and filtration systems, they also opted to add specially built witnessing rooms.
Most of the rooms can accommodate up to 100 people comfortably and are part of the public facilities at the cemetery or funeral centre. “Cremation was once a function that took place behind closed doors and you weren’t a part of it,” says Cowan. “We’ve tried to bring it out of the shadows and turn it into a meaningful part of an individual’s journey through the process of death.”
Cremation, he points out, has grown in popularity dramatically since MPG built its first crematorium at the Necropolis Cemetery in 1933. In fact, about 67 per cent of families in the GTA choose cremation over traditional burial today, up from 52 per cent ten years ago.
And as cremation has gained advocates, so has witnessing. It is a tradition long associated with cremation. The early Vikings typically cremated their dead in a solemn ceremony during which friends and family gathered round the funeral pyre for the send-off of their loved one. And South Asian traditions typically call for family and friends to witness cremation, with the eldest male member circling the body three times before setting the pyre alight.
In the GTA, witnessing initially began as a request of the South Asian community, but has since spread to other religious and cultural groups. “We’re seeing an increase in the number of people asking for a witnessing service,” says Cowan. “I think with the diversity of the GTA, we may attend services where we’re exposed to witnessing and people begin to see the benefits.”
Today’s version of witnessing is kinder and gentler, however. Family members start the process of cremation by pressing a button rather than lighting a match. And they don’t actually watch the casket burn.
“There can be some confusion over what the term witnessing means,” explains Cowan. “The first conclusion that people tend to jump to when you say ‘witnessing’ and ‘cremation’ in the same sentence is that you’re asking them to view the cremation of a body. That’s not what we mean at all. You’re basically watching the casket enter the cremation chamber and the door close.”
Currently, about 20 per cent of MPG’s clients incorporate witnessing ceremonies into the cremation process. And many adapt the process to fit their own cultural traditions — having a religious officiant say a few words over the casket before it is consigned to the fire, or simply taking a moment to say goodbye.
For many families, cremation has a practical purpose, says Cowan, allowing them to choose a less expensive casket or delay a memorial service until far-flung family members arrive. And in our mobile society, the ashes can be divided among family members in keepsake urns, paintings or jewellery so their loved one can be with them wherever they go.
But ultimately, Cowan says, witnessing adds an element of ceremony to the procedure. “It’s a way of being with your loved one to the very end,” he explains. “You are there to make sure their wishes are being fulfilled and they aren’t by themselves at the end.”