NEWS STORY: Catholic bishops vote to ask Vatican to loosen rules on cremation

c. 1996 Religion News Service PORTLAND, Ore. _ Responding to the growing American funeral practice of cremation, the nation’s Roman Catholic bishops Friday (June 21) voted to ask the Vatican to allow Roman Catholic parishes to bring cremated remains into a church for the funeral Mass. The vote was 179-20 with one abstention. The bishops’ […]

c. 1996 Religion News Service

PORTLAND, Ore. _ Responding to the growing American funeral practice of cremation, the nation’s Roman Catholic bishops Friday (June 21) voted to ask the Vatican to allow Roman Catholic parishes to bring cremated remains into a church for the funeral Mass.

The vote was 179-20 with one abstention. The bishops’ action does not change church policy in the United States. The Vatican still has to decide on the matter.


Current church practice, as dictated by the Vatican, frowns on cremation and prohibits the presence of the cremated remains in a church during the funeral liturgy. Only a memorial Mass, rather than the full funeral liturgy, is said when a cremation is involved.

Because it was considered a denial in the belief of the resurrection of the dead, cremation was forbidden in the Catholic Church until 1963, when an exception was made for what the Vatican called”cases of necessity.” But according to the bishops’ Committee on Liturgy, a 1991 survey showed that one-third of all American Catholics stated a preference for cremation. A study by the Cremation Society of America estimates that in the year 2000, 22 percent of all funerals in the United States will be by cremation.

Bishop Donald W. Trautman of Erie, Pa., chairman of the liturgy committee, estimated that 20 percent of Catholic funerals involve cremation.

The issue sparked a brief but lively debate among the approximately 250 bishops attending the three-day spring meeting of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops.”Most people choose cremation for economic reasons,”Trautman said of the growing practice.”This is a cultural reality we must face.” He said that for many church members, it is not economically feasible to follow Catholic tradition, which involves a wake, the cost of the casket, use of the funeral home before the Mass, and then burial.

The request to the Vatican, he said, was an effort to be”pastorally sensitive”to the reality of cremation.

The Vatican has already given permission to the Catholic Church in Canada and to four dioceses in the United States to allow cremated remains to be present in a church during the celebration of the funeral Mass. The four dioceses are Reno and Las Vegas, Nev.; Honolulu; and Pueblo, Colo.

According to Trautman, the church is not consistent in its practice regarding cremation and funeral liturgies.”We ask that the cremated remains be buried or disposed of reverently since they are the remains of the person, but we do not allow them in church,”he said.”Either the cremated remains are the remains of the person and deserve respect _ or they aren’t.” During the debate, several bishops supported the effort to be sensitive but warned that it could undermine the church’s traditional view of the body.


Bishop Charles Chaput of Rapid City, S.D., while saying he supported the request to the Vatican, warned that it”subordinates theological concerns … to the prevailing practices of society.”The next step is to say that the body isn’t all that important,”he said.

Bishop Donald Wuerl of Pittsburgh agreed with many of Chaput’s concerns, but said,”pastorally, we need to be in position to respond”to families who choose cremations.

Bishop Kenneth Untener of Saginaw, Mich., also voiced support for the proposal, but expressed concern that”we’re gradually losing our (Catholic) funeral tradition. It is an ancient tradition that is slipping away.” Under the proposal adopted by the bishops, while cremation would be more generally approved, the church would still forbid such practices as the scattering of the ashes or placing them in a place of honor in the home.

MJP END ANDERSON

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