Green burials gaining popularity
By Laura Forbes, Fox 21
When our loved ones die, it often goes without saying that there will be a traditional funeral, in a mortuary, with embalming and an intricate casket. But many feel those practices are harmful to the earth, and more and more people are opting for “green burials.”
Many advocates of green burials acknowledge this may sound strange to people at first, and that it may not be for everyone. But they want to educate people about their options– that their environmental beliefs can be taken to the grave.
When Peggy Quinn’s father, Dean, was dying, there was no question how his life would be honored. As a lifelong rancher, he was connected to nature, and the cycle of life and death. “He told us I just want a pine box, I want to go back to mother earth, because the earth really was his mother,” said Quinn.
In his final days, he rested in his bed with his art surrounding him, while his family prepared for his passage in the next room. They burned meaningful markings into the wood on his casket.
“Another grandchild would come in, and go in and sit with dad, and then come out and say, ‘I want to do a lamb,”, and so it was woven into this beautiful grieving process,” said Quinn.
Karen Van Vuuren is the founder of Natural Transitions in Boulder. She was inspired by a woman who lost her seven-year-old daughter, and held services at home, followed by a green burial. It was an experience much different from her own. She was just 12 years old when she lost her younger brother.
“My father, he meant really well, but he did not want me to see my brother, age nine, and now I think that would have been a good thing for me to experience,” said Van Vuuren.
She says, although far from the norm, green burials are becoming more common. “The baby boomer generation is wanting more control, but is also looking at the impact of these practices that have become very traditional.”
Practices like embalming, which uses toxic chemicals Karen says eventually seep into the earth. Instead, green viewings use refrigeration or dry ice, which they say is not as scary as it sounds.
“Dry ice is not encasing the body in dry ice, its simply putting it in certain areas, over the torso, so it is cooled adequately,” said Van Vuuren.
“The word that was used as the people passed through was that dad looked triumphant, and he did. He looked like, its all so easy,” said Quinn.
Dean wanted a pine box– one of several biodegradable options. Recently, two small children drew messages to their mother on a casket made of cardboard.
“There were rainbows on that casket, a symbol of mom going over the rainbow to the other side,” said Van Vuuren.
Green burials often take place in conservation areas– free of chemicals, pesticides, and fertilizers.
“There are no monuments, no markers, you can go for a walk or hike there, and also visit the place where your loved one had their final resting place,” said Van Vuuren.
There are no such places in Colorado, but in at least one city, Greeley, there is an initiative to create one.
“Its in keeping with a change, where people want to have less impact on the earth with everything they do in their life, and that includes death,” said Van Vuuren.
Dean was buried at his ranch in Wyoming. Daughter Peggy takes comfort in knowing he died with the values he lived.
Going green can often be easier on the budget, and green burials are no exception. According to the National Funeral Directors Association, in 2004, the average price of a funeral was $6,500, not including cemetery costs. A home-based green funeral often costs less than a thousand.