Civil funeral ceremonies which perfectly reflect your loved one's nature, life and personality
I am a fully qualified and experienced funeral celebrant, working with clients across Ireland.
Times are changing. People's approach to end of life ceremonies and funerals are reflective of our changing World. Thus, we find that funeral practices in Ireland, have undergone noticeable changes in the last few years as well; there has been a clear shift away from the impersonal, standardised and religiously-led funeral services of the past.
More and more people are looking for something different, that is more personally reflective, and that doesn't follow specific and traditional rules or regulations.
Sometimes i'm asked to work with people who know the end is not to far in the distance and this is a deeply rewarding process and certainly a privilege to be involved in. Some people like to discuss and lay out their plans in advance and talk about their hopes and fears.
I also work with families who have just lost a loved one and in times of deep trauma work with them on developing an appropriate and meaningful end of life ceremony for their loved one.
The setting for such services can vary from crematorium, unitarian church, or an outdoor ceremony to scatter ashes.
Modern funerals allow the grieving family a wider range of options that were unheard of years ago. These modern funerals are often referred to by a number of different terms; non-religious funerals, secular funerals, unaffiliated funerals etc.
I am professionally trained to lead all of these types of funeral ceremony and Celebrations of Life. I also offer support throughout the whole process, relieving the family i'm working with, of as much stress, and offering as much support as possible, when it comes to putting together, the most personal of farewells.
Most aspects of today’s funeral ceremony can come down to personal choice; families may well take an active role in choosing the music and readings and may wish to speak from the heart, about the person who has passed away.
My primary task, as a professional funeral celebrant, is to assist families in creating a funeral that fully reflects the person’s nature, life and personality.
A Civil Funeral can provide an opportunity to publicly express the different feelings and emotions that well up when a loved one dies; it may well recognise the grief of the family’s loss, maybe his or her understanding of the meaning of life and death but most importantly, provides an opportunity to tell the loved one’s story, provide anecdotes and show the love that still remains.
Unfortunately, I have come to learn that to be able to truly connect with and fully support a grieving family, or person wishing to plan their own farewell ceremony during the time they have left, one has to have personally experienced such pain and loss, in order to empathise.
For me, that time came with the passing of my beloved brother.
It was once I had lost him, that it hit me how important and spiritually therapeutic it was to outline the memories, pride and deep love that I had for him, into a eulogy.