The service itself, and what is done with the body.
Cited background on how traditions meet this moment, with no ritual instructions. The texts further down come from named editions and were checked against them; none has yet been signed by a reviewer credentialed in its tradition. How that works.
A funeral answers two questions at once: what should happen to the body, and what should be said over it. Traditions answer differently, and the differences are practical before they are theological. Jewish and Muslim practice presses toward burial within about a day, which shapes everything from the release of the body to relatives' travel plans. Hindu practice treats cremation as the norm, the last of the samskaras, while Islam forbids cremation, Orthodox Christianity generally refuses it, and the Catholic Church permits it with conditions about where the ashes may rest. Knowing which frame a family stands in is the first act of care, whether the person asking is a relative, a chaplain, or a funeral director.
The second question divides just as sharply. A Catholic funeral Mass is worship with a homily, not a stage for eulogies; a Presbyterian service calls itself a witness to the resurrection; a Jewish hesped honors the dead plainly; a humanist ceremony is built entirely from the life lived, with a celebrant instead of clergy. People reach a page like this in the hours after a death, often planning across traditions they do not share: a colleague's janazah, a grandmother's funeral Mass, a father's request to have no religion at all. What follows maps the norms, names the rites, and says where practice varies, so the words chosen at the service can be the right ones.
Across traditions
Awareness-level notes: what this moment tends to involve, tradition by tradition. Each links to its background page.
The Order of Christian Funerals moves through a vigil, a funeral Mass, and the Rite of Committal. The Mass calls for a homily rather than a eulogy; many parishes allow brief words of remembrance, and the vigil or the reception is the usual home for personal tributes. Cremation is permitted when not chosen against the faith, but burial is preferred, and a 2016 Vatican instruction asks that ashes rest in a cemetery or other sacred place, not scattered or kept at home.
Orthodox funerals are chanted services, usually held in church with the casket open so mourners can offer a final farewell; a Trisagion service is often held beforehand. Cremation is generally not permitted, and choosing it can mean an Orthodox funeral is declined, though pastoral handling varies by jurisdiction. Funerals are not held on Sundays. Memorial services follow at set intervals, with the forty day memorial widely observed.
Practice spans a wide spectrum, from the burial office of the Book of Common Prayer to informal celebrations of life. Reformed communities often call the funeral a service of witness to the resurrection: a worship service first, with the person's story woven in. Eulogies by family and friends are broadly welcome, cremation is widely accepted, and memorial services without the body present are common. Expect real variation between denominations and even congregations.
Burial traditionally happens as soon as possible, often within about a day, with delays accepted for Shabbat, festivals, or close relatives traveling; timing flexibility varies by movement. A chevra kadisha, the burial society, prepares the body through tahara, and simplicity governs shroud and casket. The service is brief: psalms, a hesped, and Kaddish at the graveside. Traditional practice favors burial over cremation; Reform communities are more flexible. Shiva then shifts the focus to the mourners. At the graveside and afterwards the visitor's own words are set: HaMakom yenachem etchem to the mourners on leaving, and Baruch Dayan HaEmet on first hearing that the person has died.
Burial is a communal obligation carried out promptly, ideally within a day where authorities allow. The community performs ghusl, the washing, and kafan, shrouding in plain white cloth, then gathers for Salat al-Janazah, a short standing prayer. The body is buried facing Mecca in a deliberately simple grave; caskets are used where law requires them. Cremation is forbidden. Families often need a funeral home experienced in prompt release and same gender washing arrangements.
Antyeshti, the last of the samskaras, treats cremation as the norm, traditionally led by the eldest son and held quickly, within hours or a day in India and as soon as practical in the diaspora. Ashes are typically immersed in a sacred river, with the Ganges held highest. Young children and renunciates are customarily buried instead. A mourning period of roughly thirteen days follows, with shraddha observances continuing afterward. Details vary by region and community.
There is no single Buddhist funeral; practice varies widely by school and culture. Cremation is common, following the example of the Buddha, and monastics are often invited to chant, with merit dedicated to the deceased. Many Mahayana and Vajrayana communities observe memorial rites across forty nine days, understood as an intermediate period before rebirth, while Theravada communities emphasize merit making gatherings. Families frequently blend temple rites with funeral home logistics.
Antam Sanskar, the final rite, centers on cremation, acceptance of the divine will, and composure in mourning; loud lamentation is discouraged. Ashes are typically immersed in flowing water, and monuments over remains are not erected. Families often undertake a reading of the Guru Granth Sahib in the days after death, concluding with a Bhog ceremony and Ardas; Kirtan Sohila is associated with the funeral itself.
Mixed families often hold one service with two vocabularies, or a religious funeral followed by a separate memorial shaped for the other side of the family. Clergy and celebrants regularly co-officiate. The sharpest decisions arrive early: burial or cremation, and how fast, since Jewish and Muslim promptness can collide with relatives' travel and with another tradition's viewing customs. Naming those trade-offs before the funeral home meeting spares grief later.
Humanist and other non-religious funerals are a full genre of their own, not a stripped down church service. A trained celebrant builds the ceremony around the life lived: music the person loved, readings, a substantial tribute drawn from time with family and friends, and quiet reflection that religious guests can use for private prayer. Humanists UK and comparable bodies accredit celebrants, and the tone can run from formal to lighthearted.
Texts from their published editions
Each text below comes from the edition named under it and was checked twice, independently, before it appeared. Neither check was a person. Where the two disagreed by even one character, the text is not shown here. That is a claim about wording only: these are not selected or endorsed for any particular situation, and nobody credentialed in the tradition has signed them. Older spelling is kept as the edition prints it. The full record, including the texts we held back because the two transcriptions disagreed, is at the verification record.
A Suttanipata discourse on the inevitability of death and on grief as a barb that the mourner draws out rather than deepens. It is used pastorally rather than liturgically, read at funerals and in bereavement teaching across Theravada communities, and is one of the canonical sources for Buddhist counsel to the bereaved.
English · The Sacred Books of the East, Vol. X: The Dhammapada and Sutta-Nipata, 1881Read twice, independently
Without a cause and unknown is the life of mortals in this world, troubled and brief, and combined with pain.
For there is not any means by which those that have been born can avoid dying; after reaching old age there is death, of such a nature are living beings.
As ripe fruits are early in danger of falling, so mortals when born are always in danger of death.
As all earthen vessels made by the potter end in being broken, so is the life of mortals.
Both young and grown-up men, both those who are fools and those who are wise men, all fall into the power of death, all are subject to death.
Of those who, overcome by death, go to the other world, a father does not save his son, nor relatives their relations.
Mark! while relatives are looking on and lamenting greatly, one by one of the mortals is carried off, like an ox that is going to be killed.
So the world is afflicted with death and decay, therefore the wise do not grieve, knowing the terms of the world.
For him, whose way thou dost not know, either when he is coming or when he is going, not seeing both ends, thou grievest in vain.
If he who grieves gains anything, (although he is only) a fool hurting himself, let the wise man do the same.
Not from weeping nor from grieving will any one obtain peace of mind; (on the contrary), the greater his pain will be, and his body will suffer.
He will be lean and pale, hurting himself by himself, (and yet) the dead are not saved, lamentation (therefore) is of no avail.
He who does not leave grief behind, goes (only) deeper into pain; bewailing the dead he falls into the power of grief.
Look at others passing away, men that go (to what they deserve) according to their deeds, beings trembling already here, after falling into the power of death.
In whatever manner people think (it will come to pass), different from that it becomes, so great is the disappointment (in this world); see, (such are) the terms of the world.
Even if a man lives a hundred years or even more, he is at last separated from the company of his relatives, and leaves life in this world.
Therefore let one, hearing (the words of) the saint, subdue his lamentation; seeing the one that has passed away and is dead, (let him say): 'He will not be found by me (any more).'
As a house on fire is extinguished by water, so also the wise, sensible, learned, clever man rapidly drives away sorrow that has arisen, as the wind a tuft of cotton.
He who seeks his own happiness should draw out his arrow (which is) his lamentation, and complaint, and grief.
He who has drawn out the arrow and is not dependent (on anything) will obtain peace of mind; he who has overcome all sorrow will become free from sorrow, and blessed (nibbuta).
V. Fausboll and F. Max Muller. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1881. Published 1881, before 1929, US public domain, and both translators died before 1929. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
One of the seven penitential psalms and the psalm most associated in Catholic practice with prayer for the dead, said at funerals, in the Office of the Dead, and privately after a death. Catholic English editions follow Vulgate numbering, so it appears as Psalm 129 in Douay-Rheims and Psalm 130 in most other Bibles.
Wording and scope vary between editions and between communities, so this entry is tied to one named edition and makes no claim about which form is right in a given setting.
A psalm for David. The Lord ruleth me: and I shall want nothing.
He hath set me in a place of pasture. He hath brought me up, on the water of refreshment:
He hath converted my soul. He hath led me on the paths of justice, for his own name's sake.
For though I should walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they have comforted me.
Thou hast prepared a table before me against them that afflict me. Thou hast anointed my head with oil; and my chalice which inebreateth me, how goodly is it!
And thy mercy will follow me all the days of my life. And that I may dwell in the house of the Lord unto length of days.
Challoner revision. John Murphy Company, Baltimore, 1899. Published 1899, before 1929, US public domain. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Wording and scope vary between editions and between communities, so this entry is tied to one named edition and makes no claim about which form is right in a given setting.
En lugares de delicados pastos me hará yacer: junto á aguas de reposo me pastoreará.
Confortará mi alma; guiaráme por sendas de justicia por amor de su nombre.
Aunque ande en valle de sombra de muerte, no temeré mal alguno; porque tú estarás conmigo: tu vara y tu cayado me infundirán aliento.
Aderezarás mesa delante de mí, en presencia de mis angustiadores: ungiste mi cabeza con aceite: mi copa está rebosando.
Ciertamente el bien y la misericordia me seguirán todos los días de mi vida: y en la casa de Jehová moraré por largos días.
Casiodoro de Reina and Cipriano de Valera, 1909 revision. 1909. Published 1909, before 1929, US public domain, and distributed as public domain by ebible.org. Later Reina-Valera revisions such as RVR1960 are in copyright and are not used here. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Cantique de David. L'Eternel est mon berger: je ne manquerai de rien.
Il me fait reposer dans de verts pâturages, Il me dirige près des eaux paisibles.
Il restaure mon âme, Il me conduit dans les sentiers de la justice, A cause de son nom.
Quand je marche dans la vallée de l'ombre de la mort, Je ne crains aucun mal, car tu es avec moi: Ta houlette et ton bâton me rassurent.
Tu dresses devant moi une table, En face de mes adversaires; Tu oins d'huile ma tête, Et ma coupe déborde.
Oui, le bonheur et la grâce m'accompagneront Tous les jours de ma vie, Et j'habiterai dans la maison de l'Eternel Jusqu'à la fin de mes jours.
Louis Segond. 1910. Published 1910, before 1929, US public domain; the translator died in 1885. Later Segond revisions such as Segond 21 are in copyright and are not used here. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Four words said on hearing that someone has died: blessed is the true Judge. The Mishnah lists it among the blessings said on news, the one for news that is bad, and it is what a Jewish family says aloud at the moment they are told. It is also the phrase written at the top of a death announcement, which is how most people meet it.
Sefaria, 2026. Sefaria labels this version Public Domain. The Mishnah itself is ancient and the pointing follows the standard printed editions. Checked against Hebrew Wikisource's separately keyed vocalized Mishnah. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-20. Cite as: Mishnah Berakhot 9:2, Mishnah, Torat Emet edition, via Sefaria.org. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
No English is set beside the Hebrew. The blessing is four words and the usual English, “blessed is the true Judge”, is not taken here from any edition: the one public-domain prayer book that prints it, Singer’s of 1904, gives it only as the tail of an elided formula, “On hearing Evil Tidings: — the true Judge”, with the opening words printed once further up the page. Setting a translation beside it that came from nowhere would be the failure this site exists to avoid. The full blessing as it is said in the liturgy opens with the standard formula naming God, and saying a blessing has conditions this entry makes no claim about; what is verified here is the wording of the four words the Mishnah records.
A psalm of trust that ends with the path of life. In many communities it is read in a house of mourning on days when the usual mourning psalm is not said, and at funerals on those days.
Sefaria, from the Unicode/XML Leningrad Codex at tanach.us, 2026. Tanach.us states that all biblical Hebrew text on its site may be viewed or copied without restriction, and Sefaria labels this version Public Domain. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-17. Cite as: Psalms 16:1-11, Tanach with Nikkud, a digital edition of the Leningrad Codex, via Sefaria.org. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Wording and scope vary between editions and between communities, so each edition here is named and this entry makes no claim about which form is right in a given setting. The English keeps the line breaks of one digitisation of the 1917 volume. The second, which it was checked against, stores each verse as running text, so it confirms the words and cannot confirm where a line ends.
A short psalm of trust attributed to David, widely used at funerals, at memorial gatherings and at the Sabbath afternoon meal in some communities. In Jewish use it is read in Hebrew from the Book of Psalms and is not tied to a fixed liturgical slot the way the fixed prayers are.
Sefaria, from the Unicode/XML Leningrad Codex at tanach.us, 2026. Tanach.us states that all biblical Hebrew text on its site may be viewed or copied without restriction, and Sefaria labels this version Public Domain. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-02. Cite as: Psalms 23:1-6, Tanach with Nikkud, a digital edition of the Leningrad Codex, via Sefaria.org. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Wording and scope vary between editions and between communities, so each edition here is named and this entry makes no claim about which form is right in a given setting. The two columns do not cover quite the same span: the Hebrew opens with the psalm's superscription, “A Psalm of David”, which the English published here does not carry, because the two transcription passes over the JPS volume agreed only from the first verse proper.
Sefaria, from the Unicode/XML Leningrad Codex at tanach.us, 2026. Tanach.us states that all biblical Hebrew text on its site may be viewed or copied without restriction, and Sefaria labels this version Public Domain. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-17. Cite as: Psalms 91:1-16, Tanach with Nikkud, a digital edition of the Leningrad Codex, via Sefaria.org. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Wording and scope vary between editions and between communities, so each edition here is named and this entry makes no claim about which form is right in a given setting. The English keeps the line breaks of one digitisation of the 1917 volume. The second, which it was checked against, stores each verse as running text, so it confirms the words and cannot confirm where a line ends.
The opening sura, recited in every unit of each of the five daily prayers and so the most frequently said text in Islam. It is also read for the sick, at gravesides and at the start of gatherings in many communities.
Tanzil Project (https://tanzil.net/), served by alquran.cloud, 2026. Not public domain, and the first licensed edition in this corpus. Tanzil grants permission to copy and distribute verbatim copies provided the source is named and tanzil.net is linked, and forbids altering the text. Both conditions are met here. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-04. Source
Licensed, not public domain: copy it only word for word, and name and link the source as its terms require. The terms.
The Arabic is published without an English rendering. The securely public-domain English translations are nineteenth-century orientalist work that no Muslim community uses devotionally, and setting one beside the Arabic would present it as the meaning of the prayer. Recitation in Islamic practice has conditions this entry makes no claim about; what is verified here is the wording of the edition named below.
The verse containing the words said on hearing of a death or any loss: we belong to God and to him we return. The phrase is on the lips of Muslims everywhere at a bereavement.
Tanzil Project (https://tanzil.net/), served by alquran.cloud, 2026. Not public domain, and the first licensed edition in this corpus. Tanzil grants permission to copy and distribute verbatim copies provided the source is named and tanzil.net is linked, and forbids altering the text. Both conditions are met here. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-17. Source
Licensed, not public domain: copy it only word for word, and name and link the source as its terms require. The terms.
The Arabic is published without an English rendering. The securely public-domain English translations are nineteenth-century orientalist work that no Muslim community uses devotionally, and setting one beside the Arabic would present it as the meaning of the prayer. Recitation in Islamic practice has conditions this entry makes no claim about; what is verified here is the wording of the edition named below. The verse is given whole, as the edition prints it, including the words that introduce the prayer, because this text is used on condition that it is not altered, and a verse cut short is altered.
The kontakion for the departed, sung at Orthodox funerals and at the memorial services that follow them. It asks rest for the person who has died, in a place without sickness, sorrow or sighing.
With the Saints give rest, O Christ, to the soul of thy servant, where there is neither sickness, nor sorrow, nor sighing, but life everlasting.
Isabel Florence Hapgood. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, Boston and New York, 1906. Published 1906, before 1929, US public domain, and the translator died in 1928. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-17. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Hapgood's is one English rendering among several, and most parishes today use a later one; hers is printed here because it is the one that is out of copyright. She is also not consistent with herself. The same prayer appears with different punctuation in different services of the same 1906 volume, so this is the text as printed in the Order for the Burial of the Dead (Laymen), and makes no claim to be the only form.
The hymn of Pascha, sung over and over through the Easter season and used as a greeting between people in that season. It is also sung at the burial of a Christian who dies during Easter week, which is where its use at a death comes from.
Christ is risen from the dead, trampling down Death by death, and upon those in the tomb bestowing life.
Isabel Florence Hapgood. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, Boston and New York, 1906. Published 1906, before 1929, US public domain, and the translator died in 1928. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-17. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Hapgood's is one English rendering among several, and most parishes today use a later one; hers is printed here because it is the one that is out of copyright. She is also not consistent with herself. The same prayer appears with different punctuation in different services of the same 1906 volume, so this is the text as printed in the Order for the Burial of the Dead (Laymen), and makes no claim to be the only form.
The thrice-holy hymn: one line addressing God as holy, mighty and immortal. It is sung in the Divine Liturgy, said three times near the start of most prayer, and chanted as a body is carried to burial.
O Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal One, have mercy upon us.
Isabel Florence Hapgood. Houghton, Mifflin and Company, Boston and New York, 1906. Published 1906, before 1929, US public domain, and the translator died in 1928. Retrieved and verified 2026-09-17. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Hapgood's is one English rendering among several, and most parishes today use a later one; hers is printed here because it is the one that is out of copyright. She is also not consistent with herself. The same prayer appears with different punctuation in different services of the same 1906 volume, so this is the text as printed in the Third Hour, and makes no claim to be the only form.
The psalm most used in Protestant and Anglican pastoral practice at illness, dying and funerals. Anglicans encounter it in two distinct English forms that are not interchangeable: Miles Coverdale's psalter, bound into the 1662 Book of Common Prayer and used for said and sung offices, and the King James Version rendering used in most Protestant Bible reading.
The Lord is my shepherd : therefore can J lack nothing.
He shall feed me in a green pasture : and lead me forth beside the waters of comfort.
He shall convert my soul : and bring me forth in the paths of righteousness, for his names sake.
Yea, though J walk through the valley of the shadow of death, J will fear no evil : for thou art with me, thy rod, and thy staff comfort me,
Thou shalt prepare a table before me, against them that trouble me : thou hast anointed my head with oil, and my cup shall be full.
But [thy] loving kindness and mercy shall follow me all the dayes of my life : and J will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.
Church of England, 1662. Published 1662, long before 1929, US public domain. UK Crown patent applies within the United Kingdom, so this edition is used here on the US basis only. Source
Out of copyright in the United States on the basis stated here, and free to reuse there. Please keep the citation with it.
Ask early, and ask the family rather than assuming from a surname. The load bearing questions are few: burial or cremation, how soon, who leads the service, and whether the body needs ritual washing by family or community members. For Jewish and Muslim deaths, speed matters; hospital staff and medical examiners can help or hinder prompt release of the body, and families may need an advocate. Tell the funeral director about religious requirements at the first phone call, not at the arrangement conference; funeral directors maintain clergy contacts and customs references for exactly this reason. Where clergy and a funeral home are both involved, let each do its job: the director owns logistics and paperwork, the officiant owns the service. For mixed or uncertain families, a hospital chaplain or an accredited celebrant can hold a respectful middle. Never press a grieving family toward more ritual, or less, than they want; offer options and follow their lead.
When to call someone instead: Call a person, not a page, whenever the death involves a tradition you do not know from the inside: the family's own clergy, the local mosque, synagogue, temple, or gurdwara, or a hospital chaplain who can reach them. Funeral homes routinely connect families with officiants of any tradition, and humanist organizations keep celebrant registers. Where burial speed matters, call the funeral director and the relevant clergy the same day. Family disputes over cremation or the shape of the service are pastoral problems; a chaplain or trusted officiant mediates them better than any text.
Need your own words right now? The composer assembles a short prayer for funerals and burial from human-written lines, with or without religious language, free and without sending anything you type to anyone.
Questions people arrive with
Why are Jewish and Muslim funerals held so quickly?#
Both traditions treat prompt burial as an honor owed to the dead, ideally within about a day. In Jewish practice, delays are accepted for Shabbat, festivals, or close relatives traveling, and a chevra kadisha prepares the body first. In Islam, burial is a communal duty, preceded by washing, shrouding, and the janazah prayer. In both cases families often need funeral homes and authorities to move faster than the usual paperwork rhythm, which is worth flagging immediately.
Yes, with conditions. The Church has permitted cremation since 1963, while stating a clear preference for burial. The 2016 Vatican instruction Ad resurgendum cum Christo asks that ashes rest in a cemetery or another sacred place, and rules out scattering them, dividing them, or keeping them at home except by rare permission. The full funeral liturgy can still be celebrated when cremation is chosen. Orthodox Christianity, by contrast, generally does not permit cremation at all.
A trained celebrant, not clergy, leads a ceremony built around the person's life: music they loved, readings, a substantial tribute prepared with family and friends, and time for reflection, which religious guests often use for private prayer. There is no worship and no reference to an afterlife. Humanists UK and similar bodies elsewhere train and accredit celebrants. The format flexes from formal to informal, and either burial or cremation can follow.
Usually not in the form most people imagine. The Order of Christian Funerals calls for a homily and states that it should never be a eulogy. Many dioceses permit brief words of remembrance by one speaker near the end of Mass, and the vigil the evening before, or the reception afterward, is the expected home for fuller personal tributes. Ask the parish early, since local policy varies.
Nearby moments
Grief and mourning: After a death, including the formal mourning periods traditions set.
Peace: Peace of mind, peace in a household, peace between peoples.
Faith: Holding on to belief, and finding it again.
Sources
The claims above rest on the following. Where practice varies, the variation is stated rather than resolved.
Ad resurgendum cum Christo, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (2016). Vatican instruction on burial and cremation; verified the preference for burial, the conditions under which cremation is permitted, and the requirement that ashes rest in a sacred place rather than being scattered, divided, or kept at home.
Preparing for a Jewish Funeral: A Guide, ReformJudaism.org (Union for Reform Judaism). Movement guide confirming that Jewish tradition urges burial within about 24 hours, with flexibility in Reform practice for families who cannot hold an immediate funeral.
Chevra Kadisha, or Jewish Burial Society, My Jewish Learning. Explains the burial society and tahara, the ritual preparation of the body performed by men for men and women for women; used for the Jewish preparation and community care claims.
Islamic funeral, Wikipedia. Encyclopedic overview, cross-checked against multiple funeral practice guides; used for prompt burial norms, ghusl, kafan, the janazah prayer as a communal obligation, burial facing Mecca, grave simplicity, and the prohibition of cremation.
Antyeshti: Funeral Rites, Heart of Hinduism, ISKCON Educational Services. Tradition based explainer; used for cremation as the Hindu norm, the eldest son's role, immersion of ashes in sacred rivers, burial of small children and renunciates, and the roughly thirteen day mourning period.
Humanist funerals and memorials, Humanists UK. The main accrediting body for humanist celebrants in Britain; used for the structure and ethos of non-religious funerals: a celebrant led ceremony of music, readings, tribute, and reflection with no worship.
Funerals, Saints Peter and Paul Greek Orthodox Church, Saints Peter & Paul Greek Orthodox Church, Glenview. Parish guidance consistent with wider Greek Orthodox practice; used for the open casket custom with a farewell kiss, the bar on funerals for those cremated, no funerals on Sundays, and Trisagion memorials at three, nine, and forty days.
Content last changed 6 October 2026. Dates come from this page’s own revision history, not from the last time the site was deployed.
