Avoid embalming. Embrace composting.

[Maria]

In Seattle, a local nonprofit group wants to become the world's first organization to offer as a service human composting, in which the departed are turned into nutrient-rich soil that can be used to grow flowers, trees or food. ...

Spade said she hopes to get the service up and running in three years. But the project has significant legal and regulatory hurdles to surmount before it can get under way.

http://news.yahoo.com/greenest-goodbye- ... 29263.html

Would not this method be more in line with the Orthodox way where the deceased are neither embalmed nor cremated.

I do not like the idea of turning the human compost as suggested in the article, but the traditional Greek method was to bury a deceased one, and then after three years dig up the grave. If the deceased were still in the process of decomposition, it would be promptly reburied, if not, then the grave would be available to someone else after any bones were relocated into a special vault or repository where human skulls and bones were stored. However, in the rare event that the deceased one was found miraculously preserved, then that body would be washed, dressed in new clothes, and then placed in a coffin and moved to another area.

Read Hamlet, where the grave diggers were digging up an old grave in which to place a newly departed body.

[Matthew]

Yes, the most dignified and respectful and loving treatment of our departed loved ones is to bury them without embalming, and definitely no cremation. But as for the idea of using them for making nutrient rich soil to grow our food...YUCK! What a sick idea. :ohvey:

[Maria]

Yes, the most dignified and respectful and loving treatment of our departed loved ones is to bury them without embalming, and definitely no cremation.

Agreed. However, the funeral industry has convinced us that we must have funeral plaques or tomb stones and that our loved ones need a "permanent resting place." Nothing is permanent. An earthquake, tsunami, flood, or avalanche of mud can bury a cemetery.

Notice that the article fails to discuss what happens with the bones. We see pictures from Mt. Athos where vaults are full of skulls. However, each skull has been labelled with the name of the departed. Obviously these skulls did not decompose.

In cremation, after burning the corpse, intact skulls and bones remain. The ground up bones along with powdered concrete from the grinders are mixed with the ashes. So the remains in the fancy urns contain not only ashes, but also bits of bones and powdered concrete. In addition, ashes from previously cremated corpses can contaminate the ashes as the crematory is not cleaned thoroughly after the remains are removed. This information and more was provided to me by the crematory when my brother-in-law was cremated. I will spare you all the details.

But as for the idea of using them for making nutrient rich soil to grow our food...YUCK! What a sick idea. :ohvey:

Exactly. Consider the amount of mercury and other contaminants used in dental fillings, which would contaminate the soil. In addition, consider all the dangerous pesticides, Round Up, and herbicides consumed in vegetables, GMO-foods, fluoride containing pharmaceuticals, and over-the-counter drugs that still remain in the body of the deceased. All these would render useless any soil produced from human remains. In addition, composting temperatures of 140 degrees F or less might not sufficient to kill Norovirus and other dangerous viruses.

Residue from sewer treatment plants used to be sold as fertilizer and potting soil, and in many hardware stores, it still is. Read the labels. Some fertilizers and potting soils now contain a disclaimer disclosing the presence of contaminants such as mercury, lead, and other dangerous contaminants known to cause cancer that are found in the processed sewage. Note that most non-GMO foods are still fertilized with this processed sewage as municipalities are desperate to dispose of these dangerous wastes at very inexpensive prices. If you have ever driven through Oxnard, Ventura County, Bakersfield, Fresno, Indio and other farmlands in California, you will be offended with the stench. The farmlands in the greater Phoenix valley of Arizona also also loaded with this stench.

[Matthew]

Lord have mercy! how terrible -- the land is filled with the polutions of modern man and his godless endeavours.