Ecological cost in mind, Thane church advises members to say no to coffin

As graveyard space gets constricted and concerns grow about the environmental costs of lavish funerals, a Thane church is encouraging the idea of funerals without coffins.

St John the Baptist Church, which dates back to the sixteenth century, has asked its members to choose shroud burials and cremations. In its recent parish guidelines, the church has explained that there are two benefits from the practice - while coffins are expensive, they also involve the cutting down of trees.

The cheapest coffins cost around Rs8,000; those with teak embellishments can cost nearly Rs50,000 and even poorer families are known to stretch meagre budgets to host a memorable funeral for their dear departed. Coffins also require larger graves and while teak caskets look good, they take a longer time to decompose, making it difficult to reuse burial space more often in crowded cemeteries.

To encourage more families to opt for the method, the Thane church has given the example of groups like Hindus, Jews, Parsis and Muslims which do not use coffins for burials. “Hence burials in a shroud or cremation are not alien to our country’s culture,” the guidelines said.

Apart from local funeral traditions, priests are also relying on Biblical incidents to spread the idea. “In those days, there was no tradition of a coffin; Jesus was wrapped in a shroud,” said father Joseph D’Souza, parish priest at St Ignatius Church, Jacob Circle.

Anticipating that some tradition-minded members may not be amenable to the idea, the church has asked families to make the choice. Persons who like to be buried in the shroud or even cremated have been asked to let their families know.

“The archdiocese has issued a general statement asking parishes to take whatever action is feasible for the protection of the environment,” said father Anthony Charanghat, spokesperson for the archbishop of Bombay, Cardinal Oswald Gracias. “Each church has its own characteristic and we cannot enforce anything.”

Over the last few years, the Catholic church, especially in Vasai, has been encouraging burials without coffins. In Thane, a common coffin is available at its community centre. When there is a death, it is taken out to transport the body to the church for the mass.

After the religious service, the body is wrapped in a shroud and buried while the coffin is cleaned and readied for reuse. While the Thane church has asked for feedback from members, the idea already has supporters. A history professor who is a member of the church said, “I certainly know of people who want to scale down (funerals). Many years ago, a friend’s husband was buried in a cane casket.”

Marcia D’Cunha, member of the women’s committee at the church, said, “Burial without coffins is practical because it takes less burial space. It has been difficult to make the idea popular, but thankfully, we are now encouraging people to adopt the practice.”

The idea has its skeptics. Last year, St Ignatius Church announced that the church will pay families for funerals that do not use a coffin. There have a dozen funerals at the church since then and all featured coffins.