It’s the logical continuation of a society that allows cremation, but I’m hard-pressed to think of anything more horrid than this:

Undertakers in Belgium plan to eschew traditional burials and cremations and start dissolving corpses instead.

The move is intended to tackle a lack of burial space and environmental concerns as 573lbs of carbon dioxide are released by each cremated corpse.

Environmental concerns? The worship of nature now trumps the care of our own dead. (The website Groovy Green calls it an “option for eco-friendly burial.”)

Under the process, known as resomation, bodies are treated in a steel chamber with potassium hydroxide at high pressure and a temperature of 180c (350f).

The raised pressure and temperature means the body reaches a similar end point as in standard cremation — just bones left to be crushed up — in two to three hours.

Resomation Chamber

But here’s the good news! You may be able to do this right here in the good ol’ USA:

Six states in America have passed legislation to allow resomation and the Scottish company behind the technology says it is in talks to allow the process in the UK.

And the horrid truth behind the name? Like the underpinnings of cremation, it’s a denial of the resurrection:

The name ‘Resomation’ comes from the Greek word ‘Resoma’ meaning rebirth of the human body.

David Mills at First Thoughts (a First Things blog) invites us to contrast such a monstrous practice with Fr. Rick Frechette’s care for the dead in Haiti:

Haiti might be the only place where death with dignity entails being buried five-to-a-cardboard coffin. But it is moving and beautiful. Yet, I suggest to Frechette, it seems futile. Why do this? However horrible their lives were, this isn’t going to change that. Why spend so much time and energy serving people who’ll never know they’ve been served?

Frechette thinks about it a long while, then says, “If the dead are garbage, then the living are walking garbage.”

I watch Raphael and Fred working down in the pits. In the heat, they look like they’ve gone for a swim. Their close-cropped hair turns chalky white from the loose dirt falling in around them. They come out of the pits, which are so deep, they need running starts up the sides, and then have to grab someone’s hand above ground to pull them all the way out. Father Rick, his vestments stained with dirt and sweat, takes a spot above the body bags and cardboard coffins. There, he offers the last words these forgotten souls will ever have spoken to them:

The evening has come. The busy world is hushed. The fever of life is over. And your work on earth is left undone. In His great mercy, may God give you a safe lodging, a holy rest, and peace at last. May their souls and the souls of all the faithful, departed to the mercy of God, rest in peace.

Source: Rest in Solution

You may also be interested in: The blood-drainers have gone way too far this time

I’ve been wondering this for 11 years: Every time someone dies, the funeral home gives me a “Clergy Record,” with the deceased’s name, address, and basic details like when they were born, when they died, when the funeral is/was, and so forth. Guilt and a sense of respect for the dead keeps me from throwing it immediately in the trash. So it sits on my desk for a few months, and then I throw it away. And every time, I say to myself: What am I supposed to do with the thing? Why do they give it to me?

When I lived in southern Illinois, I had bad experience after bad experience with the funeral homes. Some were worse than others, but the men running them were all obsessed with the title “Funeral Director.” It trumped all things religious, and since our Lutheran church didn’t exactly run a Baptist tissue-soaker, it often meant war. My naivete and total unwillingness to compromise didn’t help, but I’m not sure if it would be better or worse now that I have 10 years under my belt (and too many pounds over it, alas).

I remember being up all night with a man at St. Louis University hospital. His wife died on the operating table, and afterward we planned out, together, every detail of her funeral, to be held at church. Good Lutheran hymns, use of the Pall and processional crucifix, Bible readings and no eulogies. “I want a good Lutheran funeral for my wife, Pastor.” I drove the 90+ minutes back home, slept for a couple of hours, and headed over to the mortuary to get the “funeral director” up to speed. To my astonishment, he had insisted that the funeral be at his chapel (for an extra fee, of course), and no hymns (“People in this town don’t like to sing that stuff”). Instead, we were treated to a recording of “Sunrise, Sunset” – no better Christian message at a funeral, right? I was livid – but also powerless.

While I still detest the entire “funeral industry,” funeral homes in northern Virginia are far better. They are genuinely interested in accomodating religious and cultural practices, and I’ve never had a problem with anyone here.

However, poor Father Jeffrey Leger has run into a bit of trouble – his local funeral director is suing him and the Louisville Archdiocese for “intentional and wrongful interference” in his mortuary’s business practices. Fr. Leger, it turns out, has been insisting that Roman Catholic funerals, well, follow Roman Catholic policies. You can read the whole ridiculous story here.

[Update: The original link is no longer available, but you can get the substance of the story here.]

I am very upset with Mollie Hemingway for ruining my afternoon with this story.