I interact with the “nones” nearly every week, and I’m constantly surprised at how religious they are. In recent years, American religious leaders have been obsessed with classifying, describing, understanding, discussing and evangelizing the “nones,” those people who when asked…
If the Sinner’s Prayer is the only way to salvation, why isn’t it in the Bible?
One night recently, I was speaking by phone with the adult son of a man whose funeral I would officiate a few days later. While getting to know the family and the deceased in preparation for these “pick up” funerals…
‘Grandmas make the best banana bread’
With the morning sun wrapping rays around the two windows in the bedroom, causing a pale light to creep steadily in from their edges, my oldest child rustles the bedsheets. It’s like she can feel the idea of warmth, the…
Reflections from London on the queen’s life and death
The queen is dead. Long live the king. From my earliest childhood memories during World War II, Elizabeth has been a constant in my life — a changeless symbol of stability during unstable times. By an accident of timing, I…
Here’s why cremation is now chosen after 57% of all U.S. deaths
The ongoing surge in U.S. cremation rates can accurately be described as “stunning,” author and grief educator Harold Ivan Smith said. “When I was in mortuary school in 1966, cremation was probably done in 1% of cases,” said Smith, also…
Digital e-funerals split church emotions as migration redraws Africa’s bereavement norms
Pastor Tonderai Hlahla nurses “a small grudge, sort of,” he says. ‘”My former congregants are passing on 7,600 miles overseas in England and get buried there. I, their mentor, I only get to watch their funerals on WhatsApp video; it…
When you’re tempted to forget about the latest school shooting, remember the embalmers
Note: This article includes a detailed description of burial preparation for children. I embalmed a baby, for the first time, when I was 18 years old. Another baby I did not embalm — I could not embalm — lay on…
On this date 85 years ago, the worst school tragedy in American history occurred
On Thursday afternoon, March 18, 1937, in the Texas oil boom town of New London, 694 students and 40 teachers awaited the dismissal bell and the start of a special three-day weekend. Then at 3:17 p.m., just 13 minutes before…
Is the pandemic-era church a church without baptisms, funerals and other major rituals?
“I have to ask myself: am I doing anything I was called to do when I became a pastor?”