Death is part of life: funeral culture and rituals are also changing

A lecture that the Protestant parish from Kochel had invited to the Bonhoeffer House in Benediktbeuern was about new forms of funeral culture and modern rituals.

Benediktbeuern - With the “Forum Bonhoeffer-Haus” series of events, the evangelical parish in Loisachtal, in the spirit of the eponym Dietrich Bonhoeffer, repeatedly takes on the task of discussing ethical questions of everyday social life. This time it was about the funeral culture, old and new rituals in connection with parting and death of a person. The speaker was the pastor, book author and nursing home chaplain Rainer Liephold from Munich, who has already accompanied around 800 funerals theologically and learned a lot about the feelings and behavior of those involved.

His briefly summarized advice to all relatives and mourners: "Be empathetic, courageous and authentic, allow the pain and approach those affected without shyness, embarrassment and formulaic templates, take things into your own hands and not do everything to a routine 08 / 15- Leave the program to the funeral professionals. ”If the healing social network is sustainable, the vast majority of all bereaved dependents are able to cope with the loss in a healthy way and without therapeutic help.

It is different if the normal sequence of coming and going is interrupted and parents have to carry their children to their grave.

Mourning rituals in the country are different from those in the city

In the country, according to Liephold, the closeness and togetherness in pain are much more pronounced than in the big city, where old age and death are increasingly marginalized and thus pushed out of consciousness.

This included dying at home and saying goodbye at the open grave.

A detachment from the deceased succeeds best when the farewell ceremonies take place as soon as possible after death, when the pain and emotional confrontation are still very great.

In the case of cremations, on the other hand, when the ceremony often does not take place until many weeks after death, this is no longer the case.

Then the speaker also discussed new ways of dealing with death: for example, turning away from the obligation to coffin, anonymous burials and other unusual wishes from the deceased and bereaved.

This could lead to conflicts.

But even in the country, according to Liephold, cemetery statutes with strict regulations are increasingly being liberalized, which gives more scope for individual wishes.

This led to a lively discussion after the lecture at the well-attended event.

(rbe)

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