The Chicago Tribune’s Pagans-at-Halloween story focuses on formaldehyde-free “green burials” at Circle Sanctuary in Wisconsin.
“The thought of getting filled up with formaldehyde and being placed in a sealed, laminated casket and put into a cement box in the ground is not in keeping with preserving Mother Earth,” said [Ana] Blechschmidt, a volunteer chaplain at Northern Illinois University.
“We believe the soul is eternal and immortal. So we want to leave as small a physical footprint as possible. If you honor the Earth you live on, how can you desecrate her and still honor the person you’re burying?”
I absolutely agree. But I still don’t like the C-word: “church.” I don’t like the expectations of active clergy/passive congregation-with-a-rectangular building that it carries. I don’t know if the writer applied that term or if the Circle folks used it.
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Have you touched base with CoG to ask whether its their term or the paper’s?
Josh, it was Circle, not Covenant of the Goddess, but the answer is no. Even if Circle does use the term “church” in their self-description — as a legal category, which they may certainly do — I still do not like its connotations. Sigh.
Thank you for posting this, it is very helpful & timely. I will look into the Green Burial Council as well.
The use of “church” is peculiar & awkward, isn’t it? One of my community members here in AK is a Priest of the ATC & I’ve always thought the use of church in their name was an odd choice.