Encyclopedia of Death and Dying

[RonPrice]

How people in western culture are choosing to celebrate a life after death has become increasingly creative and personal with services that often include a wide range of tangible remembrances of the deceased. Some examples include: not only pictures of loved ones placed on or in the coffin, but other objects representing the deceased’s lifetime pursuits: a favourite golf club or other sports related item, pictures of a boat, a favourite piece of music playing in the background, and anything else that might remind the mourners of the life of the departed. This has the effect of leaving mourners with the sense of the deceased having truly celebrated life. This level of personalization often includes customized caskets.

This trend in an earlier age would have seemed inappropriate and perhaps even morbid. The increased personalization of gravestones and memorials of various kinds is characterized by mixed-bag of shapes, designs, manufacturing processes, and types of personalization actually appearing on the gravestones. There is now a rapidly developing market for elaborately designed memorials both in their traditional forms, typically vertical and created out of granite with just a name and the date of death, to memorials in every conceivable size, shape and colour portraying scenes of the deceased’s everyday life. These memorials are found in Christian, Jewish and Muslim cemeteries. -Ron Price with thanks to Peter A. Maresco and Zafar U. Ahmed, “Personalized Gravestones: Your Life’s Passion for all to See and Hear,” Journal of Religion and Popular Culture, Vol. 13, Summer 2006.

For most of history tombstones told
the story of a person’s life and this
traditionally included their…name,
dates of birth and death, and in some
instances inscriptions reflecting on their
life, in effect a memorial in death. But
today’s memorials are moving to another
level commemorating a person’s life in
ways that were never before imagined.
Monuments fall into three basic general
categories: upright monuments and flat
markers as well as family mausoleums.

I could go on and on, but in my case:
my body will be wrapped in a shroud
of silk or cotton, and on my finger will
be placed a gold ring bearing the words:
"I came forth from God, and return unto
Him, detached from all save Him, holding
fast to His Name, the Merciful, the Compassionate."
The coffin will be of hard fine wood as He has said.(1)

(1) the He in this case is the Founder of the Baha’i Faith, Baha’u’llah, Who has prescribed these conditions for my burial.

Ron Price
6 July 2010