Create a personal, online experience to grieve loved ones,
Virtual funeral allowed family to create a personal experience and provide the needed closure
A friend phoned me to offer condolences on my mother’s death in mid-November. She knew about the online memorial, but assumed there would be an inperson component. She kept asking who was able to be at the funeral now that there were restrictions in place for public gatherings due to rising COVID-19 cases. I kept repeating that we were all online. She couldn’t understand that there wouldn’t be an in-person ceremony, but for me the virtual funeral provided the closure we needed. Welcome to online grieving 101. Our mother did not die from COVID-19, but it affected her dying and death as it has for millions of others the world over. Alzheimer’s may have shut down her ability to read, feed herself, recognize her children and to speak, but it was the pandemic that affected how we could be with her in her final days and then plan her funeral.
When the call came from the nursing home in London that our Mom was failing, the three siblings who live in Southwestern Ontario spent the final two days at her side. For our sister in northern Alberta, that was not possible. Technology allowed her to be present in the room through FaceTime calls, though. Together, the four of us listened to recordings from 2002 of Mom and her siblings describing Icelandic Christmas traditions on their farm outside of Gimli, Man.
Having a funeral for Mom seemed out of the question. Not just because Ontario’s COVID case counts reached alltime highs the week of her death, but also because the COVID reality for my sister in Alberta and my Mom’s four surviving siblings in Manitoba, for whom age was also a factor, meant that they would not be able to attend. Postponing the funeral until “better times” was an option, but one with its own complications. Unprecedented times called for creative solutions: using Zoom to mourn online.
Planning a virtual funeral is much the same as in person. It was a busy five days after Mom died, but it really gave us a sense of closure.
Since online conference platforms like Zoom are now part of the lockdown lexicon, there was no pushback to using a new technology. Anyone who had access to the internet could attend.
Cousins connected parents to the memorial, which meant that Mom’s siblings, ranging in age from 85 to 100 and living in Gimli, north of Winnipeg, could take part. Even without a pandemic, that would not have been possible. Her sister Gartha in a nursing home enjoyed the service thanks to wonderful staff. Mom’s sister-in-law Jill watched from Moncton, N.B. All 12 grandchildren who live right across Canada attended as did those in the Netherlands and Turkey. Nieces and nephews, my parents’ longtime friends: They were all there.
For immediate family, it enabled us to do what we would normally do after a parent’s death: grieve together and get to work planning. Staying connected during such a hard time — even though we were apart — still meant that we could
communicate with each other, and we found that frustratingly comforting (it’s still like herding cats when four siblings are involved).
Scanning photos, listening to Mom’s favourite pieces of music, gathering important memories, crafting the eulogy, deciding on scripture readings, hymns to play, we did it all from our own homes.
The service went surprisingly smoothly. One sister, Edith, co-ordinated the Zoom meeting and sent the link out to family and friends. Another sister, Liz, an ordained minister, used a funeralservice template and we created our own “Order of Service.” This bulletin included all the words to the blessings, readings and hymns, which was sent as a PDF document to mourners ahead of time. Speaking roles were divided amongst the four siblings.
A half-hour before the service began, the tech sister, Edith, opened up the Zoom meeting and began admitting people. She instructed them to turn off microphones and web cameras until after the service. The recording feature was turned on and the service began. Only siblings turned on their mics and cameras when it was their turn to speak. Our cousin Janice sang Mom’s favourite, “O Danny Boy.” Beautiful. For hymns, YouTube worked well. The closed captioning feature allowed people to sing along if they so wished.
After the service, we had a visitation. We played a Google slide deck with dozens of family photos set to Mom’s favourite songs using iTunes. When we stopped the Zoom recording, we invited people to stay for a “coffee hour,” and encouraged them to enable their mics and cameras and share their favourite stories. The most endearing moment happened when our aunts and uncle, all watching together in Gimli, got up from the TV where they had been watching to
get their actual cups of coffee and treats. We could hear them chatter. It provided normalcy to such an abnormal situation.
Family and friends told us it had all been seamless. They texted, emailed and phoned to express how special the service was to them. For many of our parents’ elderly friends, it was their first experience with Zoom and they were surprised at how easy it was. The recording feature meant that we could send the service to people who were not able to join the live stream. Some just wanted to watch it again.
An online service does not compare to an in-person funeral. All of us wish we could have been enveloped in hugs and the intimate act of grieving. But this was a close second. It allowed us to grieve right now as opposed to delaying it. We might all be separated by a pandemic and thousands of kilometres, but I felt surrounded by a community of love during the service.
How to conduct your own online memorial
You do not have to wait for the pandemic to end to mourn a loved one. Maybe now is the time to plan an online memorial since there will be a backlog when the pandemic ends? If you are a true Luddite, now is not the time to start becoming a techno-wiz. Let yourself grieve and get others to handle the technical aspects. Find out if there is a funeral home that offers this service or look for thirdparty technology companies who can co-ordinate it. Consider appointing “ushers” for the service to admit people and make sure the guest book is signed.
Platform
Choose one that allows for enough peo
ple to join. We purchased a 100-participant subscription to Zoom Pro.
Order of service
Keep the service to under one hour. Zoom fatigue is a real thing. Are you religious? If so, chances are your faith leaders are now used to remote worship and will guide you through this process or provide it. Our family includes an ordained minister who has a template for funeral services.
If you are not religious, create your own Order of Service consisting of special readings, songs and memories. Note: the service itself shouldn’t go for longer than 40 to 50 minutes and no one person should share memories longer than five minutes.
Record the service
Some people had internet issues; others were missed. A link to the recording meant that our close friends who wanted to celebrate our mother could share in it and then discuss with us after viewing.
Accessibility
There are live-captioning services through third parties that can be used for Zoom or other online platforms. For recordings, they can be uploaded to YouTube and closed captioning added. A PDF of the Order of Service allowed mourners with vision and hearing accessibility issues to follow along.
Think hybrid
Many funeral homes and houses of worship are providing small in-person gatherings and then recording the service or streaming it live. Not all are created equal, so ask questions about the audiovisual quality, how they will handle the technology, and how they’ll incorporate the eulogy and any music or photos.