What would a green burial look like?
You may know that Funerals can get quite expensive…to the point that older adults can buy themselves a “Guaranteed Acceptance Life Insurance”, i.e.: a Life Insurance that does not require passing a medical exam. The amount covered by the Guaranteed Acceptance Life Insurance policy covers the expenses of a nice standard funeral.
The idea is that by subscribing to such an insurance you are not leaving your kids the burden of paying for the cost of your funeral.
Why are funerals expensive?
Like the rest of our lifes, the end, the standard burial is quite Energy Intensive.
Why are burials Energy Intensive??
That is a long story that has to do with various requirements. One requirement imposed by cemeteries is to have the body in a wood or metal casket which is then entombed in a concrete vault.
Think of it…..Toxic chemicals for embalming, fossil fuels the wood and/or the metal used for the casket, fossil fuels for building the casket, fossil fuels to make the cement of the concrete vault, fossil fuels for making the concrete itself and more fossil fuels to drive to the church and then to … the cemetery. Lots of fossil fuels for someone who is dead.
So what would a “Green Burial” look like?
First of all, a green burial does not involve building a concrete vault or a metal or hardwood casket.
The following story is a story written by Stephen Tobias that was originally published in the Chestnut Hill Local. It is the story of Stephen’s successful efforts to give his recently deceased wife a “Green” burial. Stephen recently lost his wife to brain cancer.
“The First Jewish Green Burial in Philadelphia”
by Steve Tobias
I think it was on National Public Radio that I first heard the phrase “green burial,” in a news story that explained that a new concept had been developed in the United Kingdom for burying the dead. The first green cemetery was established there in 1993. The idea was that instead of a cemetery, where you pack bodies in tightly with conspicuous grave markers over them, a green burial takes place in a nature preserve. Burial is but one of the activities that go on at the site, activities geared to humans participating in the natural environment. Graves are far enough apart that digging them won’t interfere with root systems already in place, and they are shallow enough that their decay contributes fully to the growth of new plant life. Of course there are no concrete vaults, required not by law but by many cemeteries for aesthetic reasons only. The plant life, in turn, offers habitat for diverse animal wildlife. Grave markers, if any, are subtle, so that they hardly alter the landscape; of course the vegetation is native, requiring no mowing, tractor exhaust, fertilizers or pesticides.
For me, the idea was a no-brainer on its face. I found a web site describing the concept and forwarded it to my wife and children with a note that said, “when I die, this is what I want you to do with my body.”
The first green cemetery in the United States was Ramsey Creek Preserve in upstate South Carolina, established in 1998. Since then the idea has been slow to take hold in this country, but by now there are probably between a half-dozen and a dozen. Some months ago, again listening to WHYY I think, I heard that West Laurel Hill Cemetery (on Belmont Avenue in Bala Cynwyd) had set aside a part of their space and dedicated it to green burial. I made a mental note to keep watching, and see if another green cemetery in a still more “natural” setting might be set up somewhere nearby. Otherwise, West Laurel Hill would serve as a good “fallback” green cemetery: problem solved.
My opportunity to become a customer tragically came very soon indeed as this past winter my wife, Rebecca, developed a vicious and aggressive brain cancer, from which she died at the end of March — twenty or thirty years sooner than we would have hoped or expected. As she neared death, the new green burial ground is the option that I thought of immediately.
My wife had written advanced directives (a VERY good idea, by the way), using a form she had found on line called “Five Wishes.” Her wish for disposal of her body after death was,
“I prefer cremation but if my husband Steve would not be able to have me cremated because of his religious beliefs and his need for Jewish law to be followed to help his grieving process, it would be ok with me if he arranged Jewish funeral.”
Cremation was, it seems, the “green” option preferred by my parents’ generation, for whom Jessica Mitford was but one of a legion who have decried excessive American burial practices. Inexpensive and convenient, cremation takes up no land and avoids any potential bio-hazard.. Plus, the image of your own body being eaten by worms is a big turnoff for many people. But there are obvious drawbacks to cremation: it consumes much more fossil fuel than you might suppose, leaving a significant carbon footprint. And it produces fumes much more toxic than you might suppose from mercury in tooth fillings, and heavy metals in any prostheses.
So our sons and I were grateful for Rebecca’s post-mortem flexibility. On the day of her death, the three of us went to West Laurel Hill to make the necessary arrangements. We bought a green plot, and cleared it with the staff that we could consecrate this plot as a Jewish burial space.
We then proceeded to Goldstein’s, a Jewish funeral home still located in North Philadelphia. We told them that we wanted Rebecca buried without a casket at all, in in just a shroud. Burial in Israel and in Muslim countries is routinely done this way, and it’s obviously the greenest way to go. But Goldstein’s couldn’t do it, having no flat rigid surface on which to carry the body. We went back and fourth between a wicker casket, available through the cemetery, or a plain pine box, which is what Orthodox Jews use. Neither option was cheap, or as easily degradable as we wanted. Finally Zach, my youngest, had a flash: “Can we bury her in a cardboard box?” he asked. “We have cardboard, that’s what we use to hold a body for cremation,” said Mr. Goldstein. Sold! And it was the cheapest option, something Rebecca would certainly have preferred, quite rightly.
Not to bury Rebecca in a cheesy way, we decided to cover the box (once a friend had offered comic relief by lettering “This Side Up” on the lid). Rebecca’s sister and our sons selected a suitable beautiful white linen tablecloth that had been my mother’s. My sister, who called just then, agreed: “Of course,” she said, “that’s exactly how it should be used!”
In a beautiful graveside ceremony Lenny Gordon, our rabbi, explained that Jewish tradition is very consistent with “green” burial options, since it disapproves of embalming and metal caskets, favoring rather a plain pine box so that decomposition may occur naturally. Judaism likewise condemns unnecessary destruction of the Creator’s work. Lenny also created a ritual in which the single grave was consecrated as a sacred Jewish burial space, as the tradition requires.
I didn’t buy a second plot for myself, hoping that something wilder, and more “natural” will be available, near where I happen to die — transporting a body also imposes an onerous carbon footprint – when my time comes. My favorite vision is to reclaim “brown fields,” using the price of the plot to pay for a land trust rather than perpetual mowing and fertilizing of perfectly good open land.
Another option which we had no time to explore is the new “do it yourself” funeral movement, which enables people to provide for themselves all the services normally provided by the funeral home. The law is usually much more flexible than you might suppose in allowing families to recover the body, preserve it in dry ice for up to a few days, prepare it at home, and transport it to its resting place. Some states even allow burial on private property in rural areas. But of course, such an option would require a very well mobilized community of family and un-squeamish friends to make legal and practical arrangements in a hurry.
Now, at least there’s green burial available in Philadelphia, and it’s available the Jewish dead as well as the gentile. I hope that others may “get it,” and create a growing market for natural spaces that happen to have bodies buried underneath them. What territory could be better for such than the demographics of Northwest Philadelphia?”