Adapted from an account sent to the Natural Death Centre.
About a year ago, Mary Griffiths asked the Buddhist group here in Abergavenny, Wales, if there was anyone interested in getting together to discuss funeral arrangements. Not wanting to leave all the decisions to her family, as had been the case when her own parents had died, she wanted to make plans now ... and so the Funeral Group was born! We have to admit that few decisions have been made, but we are clearer about the questions! We use The New Natural Death Handbook as our guide - we meet every other week - and it was in this book that we read about the Day of the Dead. This year, '98, we decided to confine our events on this day to the Buddhist Group and friends, but maybe next year we will be brave enough to advertise it more widely.
At a meeting to plan the day we decided on a sequence of events that would include guided meditation, time for people to spend alone and time to spend together as a group. We were fortunate in being able to hire a beautiful room, perfect for our needs as it was quiet and had a view of gardens and trees.
We arranged the room with our shrine in the bay-window and, after a reading of a guided meditation by Stephen Levine, there was an opportunity for people to place flowers, photographs and letters on the shrine and to light candles in memory of those who had died. This was followed by music, singing and a break for coffee, after which we sat in a circle to read aloud the poems and pieces of prose we had chosen on the subject of death. Perhaps next year, if people are willing to make copies of their contributions, we will all be able to take home a booklet as a memory of the day. The morning ended with a choice of a gentle yoga session or a walk in the gardens. After our shared lunch we enjoyed a lively hour of questions and answers with much interest in woodland burials. A break for tea, another guided meditation and then a slow and contemplative circle dance ended our day.
Ten people attended this, our first Day of the Dead. Everyone went home with copies of information sheets supplied by the Natural Death Centre, a sense of just how many decisions there are to be made concerning our own funerals and an increased awareness of the value to our Buddhist practice of contemplating our own death.
Helen Mowat, The Haven, 119 North Street, Abergavenny, Mon., Wales NP7 7EB (tel 01873 856065).
This webpage forms part of the Global Ideas Bank (www.globalideasbank.org).
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