A friend recently died and her funeral is to be held at a crematorium. We are closer to her daughter (who is responsable for the church we are now part of).
Because of the circumstances, no offence is going to be taken if we commit an etiquette faux pas, but we’d like to get things as right as possible.
I assume that it wouldn’t be inappropriate for us to attend the funeral, given that our friend has given details in the church WhatsApp group?
What do people usually send, in the absence of the common UK “no flowers, donations to X” instruction? Flowers? A wreath? Donations anyway, having asked where (maybe that will be mentioned at the funeral)?
From my own experience with funerals civil/church/crematorium
they can and do vary… so just be prepared and go with the flow.
Your presence will be appreciated.
Dress normally/warmly/comfortably.
I never send flowers but I do always sign the “Book of Remembrance” (or whatever it’s called)… with a brief message
eg: Nos sincères condoléances (then it’s usually name, address)
often, at the entrance there is a basket for cards/letters/whatever
Often, during the ceremony, the congregation will have a chance to walk up and say a last goodbye at the coffin…
at this point, sometimes there is a basket in which one puts a “coin”… (some put 20 cents some put 1 euro… but it’s just symbolic. so have a coin of some sort handy just in case)
Watch what everyone else does… and you’ll be fine.
If the WhatsApp message says which funeral director then should be able to contact them to ask about flowers and (should you so wish) visiting them in funeral parlour before actual funeral.
We’ve had too many deaths in past couple of years and close friends we do get flowers, but everyone else we just go to the funeral, sign the book, and if there is a drink/tea afterwards for everyone we go to that too.
I have only visited one French friend… in the funeral parlour… and I decided it would be my last.
So, don’t feel you have to go…
and having resolved “never again” I was daft enough to go across the road and “say goodbye” to a neighbour who was presented at home… carefully (thankfully) chilled and sitting up in his own bed…
very, very odd and I wished I hadn’t accepted his wife’s kind offer to “come and say goodbye to him in person” …
That is especially poignant for me then, as you did send flowers for Fran, which, by the way, just by turning my head from where I sit now, I can see that 2 of the original 5 plants are still thriving and the others are closed down for the winter.
All our French neighbours brought flowers to the funeral and some English ones, who couldn’t attend at the short notice, placed a pot on the grave later. All the other English (and Antipodean ) that did attend did not bring flowers but they brought themselves which to me was equally welcome.
Dress was not formal but a tad above scruffy, which is good because just above scruffy was the best I could manage. Most of us went to the coffee shop afterwards where my friends there put on a way better than I expected spread of little sandwiches etc. They do not have a licence so I brought a bottle of port (permitted by the Maire) and shared it around.
If any of them felt guilty about anything, they were amply punished by having to listen to me blather on for a couple of minutes.
This is a funeral at a crematorium. I presume the family will have chosen what kind of ceremony to adopt. There are several options. I have known a funeral ceremony in the church and then a family only final voyage to the crematorium, a non religious ceremony at the crematorium for all who wish to attend and a cremation with no ceremony at all.
There are rules for the subsequent disposal of the ashes.
Well, we went and it seemed to have been anticipated we would.
In a chalk-stripe suit but no tie (the ties are yet to be found and unpacked), I was by some margin the most formally dressed.
We bought a thingy of plants in a wicker basket, plants that would grow, as the deceased was a keen gardener. The local florist made it up from our choices.
It was rather a longer service than the UK equivalent, and there was none of the conveyor belt feeling one gets in the UK.
At the end, the whole congregation was invited to file past the coffin and write something on a card or on the coffin itself, and to drop some rose petals on it.
Afterwards, a Verre d’amitié at the church building.
My husband was cremated, the salle was like a 70’s disco without the glitter ball (he would have been quite happy) and the walls illuminated in shades of purple and blue for some reason. The seating was semi circular like an amphitheatre with the coffin at the head. We were invited to see the process of the cremation in the back which we did along with a couple of family and friends and then all into the front ofthe building where they were servicing tea,coffee and cakes and biscuits for the family. It was a brand new crematorium and now there are no chimneys, all the smoke and heat is recycled back into the building to power it. Totally different atmosphere to the UK one I always seemed to be going to for family.
I found this shocking at the first funeral I went to (a neighbour), most people were just in jeans. I’d worn my little black dress and nice boots, luckily it was cold so I had a coat on ori would have felt like a bit of a pillock,!!
We had the actual funeral in the village communal hall, it was packed out as he was very well known and had a lot of local clientelle. It finished with people dropping petals on the coffin (which they always cover here in France) to Queen’s “Who Wants to Live Forever” which I chose as it was very apt and not cheesy like some choose. I will never forget the kindness of the villagers, the maire did not charge for the hall nor any of the paperwork and I used the local family of carpenters/pompes funèbres to give them the business.
One of the many things I love about France is that informality and the feeling that it is the thought that counts, so I too have been impressed at funerals.
As @toryroo knows, Fran’s was just like that, a large group of people scattered amongst the tombs in a very sunny cemetary all in a variety of dress and I was most appreciative that they had come, some like Tory from beyond Perigueux, over 50 kms away.
As both of our nearest families who had gone before had been cremated she was always insistant that she wanted to be planted in the very soil that we had come to love, and I am 100% in agreement with that. Our little corner of France, for ever.
Fran’s coffin was uncovered and, at the request of her daughter in England, I threw a single red rose down to it after the lowering then, after I was instructed to by a French friend, I threw a handfull of soil from the large waiting bags down too. I believe others filing behind me did the same.
There was a remembrance book set on a stand nearby in which our friends wrote small dedications.
On the subject of cremation v burial, I am glad that Fran was insistant and convinced me the same way and I am pleased now that she did. I pass that way most days and if the weather has been dry, call in to water the plant on top. Then spend a few minutes chatting about things that have been happening to us recently. Knowing she is there makes it seem less daft somehow.
