In most countries, funerals take place within a few days of death. In the UK, when I began ministry as a priest in the mid-1980s, it was unusual for the delay to be as long as a week. Now the funeral is typically more than a fortnight after death. This delay is traumatic for mourners, and increasingly makes the funeral a performance to be planned rather than a transforming experience. Can readers explain why the delay is so great, and how to reduce it?

As a youngster, I was involved in the East Lancashire funeral of my grandfather in the late 1940s. He was laid out for three days in an open coffin in the lounge, in his best suit, with his cheeks rouged to look as lifelike as possible. Relatives and friends visited and sat in silence for up to an hour. Eventually, the coffin was closed and carried on the shoulders of six relatives to the church near by for the funeral service, after which he was buried near deceased relatives in the churchyard. This shows how customs have changed over the years.

Surely, the biggest change is refrigeration, enabling the body to be kept almost indefinitely. Crematoria are used by a wide community, and there can be a waiting list. The growth in relatively remote crematoria has divorced the funeral from local church life. A reluctance to face the reality of death has led to closed coffins, minimal mention of death, and admiration for principal mourners with a stiff upper lip.

In contrast, we have a prepared performance with a printed programme, with grandchildren reciting poetry, and business colleagues reading admiring or even amusing speeches about events in the life of the deceased. This takes some time to organise, but it also gives the family more time to inform those who might attend. This is surely seen as inevitable by the family, and is not, therefore, traumatic. The "performance" aspect is in honour of the deceased, and is seen as giving a good farewell.

I personally prefer the funeral to be a simple crematorium service attended by the close family, followed by a more widely attended memorial service in church some time later.

Christopher Haffner (Reader)
East Molesey

On the basis of my own experience, I disagree with the suggestion that a delay of a fortnight is traumatic for mourners. When my mother died, I arranged the funeral for eight days later, which was a mistake. On the day of the funeral, I was still in shock from her sudden death, and exhausted from all the arrangements that I had made; the funeral service passed in a complete blur, and I cannot look back with any sense that I had adequately acknowledged her full life.

Last year, after an old friend died suddenly, delays involving police, post-mortems, coroners, and registrars meant that the funeral took place more than a month after my friend's death. I had space and time to deal with my initial shock, and to contact the many people who needed to be informed - and given adequate notice of the funeral, as some had to take time off work.

Together with the Vicar, I had time to prepare a funeral service that reflected a unique individual; and many who attended the service said that the service was exactly right for the person whom they had known and loved.

(Ms) Pat Moore
Chessington, Surrey

I beg to differ from your questioner over the timing of funerals. People are all different. I needed time after my husband's sudden death, and also after my mother's death, to pause, reflect, and not rush into planning the funeral too quickly, nor to cope with administrative details straight away. The three-week delay while my son returned from the West Indies to go to his father's funeral, and the four-week gap after my mother died, to enable relatives, village and church community, and friends to gather for a thanksgiving service (which followed a family cremation service a week after she died) were all therapeutic and constructive, part of the grieving process.

J. E. S. [on a postcard. We thought this a helpful answer to publish; but ask those sending in answers to let us have, as a rule, please, their full name and address, and, if possible, telephone number. Editor]

Why are bishops' officers for non-stipendiary ministry appointed from among the stipendiary priests? Would it not be far better if they were appointed from among those priests whom they are supposed to represent? G. S.

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