We have probably all attended funerals that we found meaningful – and services that fell flat. What are the parts that make up a meaningful memorial service? What’s the difference between a funeral and a celebration of life? How does music make a difference? How can an officiate – whether secular or religious – help to hold the experience of the day for all who participate? In these modern times, with families and friends far flung, why are such rituals still relevant?

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Transcript:

Diane Hullet: Hi, I’m Dianne Hullet and welcome to the Best Life, Best Death podcast. Today I’ve got a guest that I’m super happy about because this is a subject that I’ve been meaning to cover for quite a while and really, I’ve Haven’t done so. So today’s subject is celebrations, funerals, rituals at the end of life.

And I’m talking with Sherry Stern. Hi, Sherry. Hi, nice to be here. So Sherry’s got a great business called this is how my story ends. And I just think that’s such an evocative title. I just love it. So tell us, you know, how did you get into end of life celebrant work? What, what sort of brought you there personally?

And then. How the heck do you get certified to be an end of life celebrant? 

Shari Stern: So, I got into this. I’ve, you know, you reach an age where you start going to more funerals, right? You’re a teenager. Go to a lot of weddings and then you find you are going to more funerals. And I’ve been to funerals that were okay.

I’ve been to ones where I felt unwelcome. Like I was there, but I felt like an outsider looking in and it wasn’t a very positive experience. But I’ve also been to funerals that were warm and just, Gorgeous. And I, I felt spiritually alive and I didn’t want it to end. There was just something about the ceremony and the whole arc of it and the person who was leading it that I just thought.

I want to show more people how to do that. I want more people to experience what I’m experiencing. And that started my interest. So I also have background in environmentalism, and I’ve always been interested in space. When I was a kid, we used to drive past graves, graveyards, and it just blew my mind that every person would have a space with a grave marking.

And, you know, even then, like, my caring capacity and curiosity around new life and then life that was over. Just, it was something that I thought about a lot. So during, I guess, COVID, I was just Googling and looking at articles. Somehow, I guess I hit the right Google keywords. And I saw, came to CF& I, the Celebrant Foundation and Institutes.

Website, and I saw that I could become a certified celebrant and they have different branches. And one of them is for funerals. So one of the highlights I did a, I wrote a eulogy and delivered a eulogy at my grandmother’s ceremony and I just, it was just a very meaningful time to do that. I mean, I synthesized the stories that she told me and presented it and I just wanted to do that more and more for other people.

So that’s it. That’s it. 

Diane Hullet: Yeah, that’s so great. I just, I love that. I am the same way. I sometimes have been to a funeral where I’m like, well, this fell a little flat, but okay. And then I’ve been to others that just make my heart sing. I just think, oh, they, they captured something about the person, but they captured something more universal than that.

And I’m, I’m mourning, but I’m uplifted. And, you know, as someone said to me recently, like, I didn’t know a broken heart could be so full of love. Yeah. Right. And I think that’s like the best kind of funeral makes us feel that both are our brokenheartedness and the love for the person and the family and like the whole shebang, you know, the whole human race.

Right. I think we come through in a really good funeral. You know what? Okay. So you said. to be funeral. That was the word. Now I hear celebration of life. You hear memorial services. Yeah. So there’s a lot of different terms. Are those all just terms for the same thing? 

Shari Stern: Technically? Yes. I think the word funeral is one that most people are familiar with and they know what to expect.

A celebration of life is a term that we’re hearing more and more, but. You know, I think there’s a bit of generational divide to around sort of uses of terms, you know, taking example of my parents when I spoke to him first about celebrations of life. They’re 80 years old. They could not because they didn’t experience, you know, being invited to a celebration of life at that point.

They couldn’t. Visualize what that meant. So the, so when I speak to people in general about what I do, I use the term funerals because that’s what most people know. Then as the conversation goes, I tend to find myself using words interchangeably. I’ll mention celebration of life. I’ll mention end of life ceremonies.

So I think that we are going to hear more and more about celebrations of life. And I do think that helps us. Lay the groundwork of expectations of the ceremony, what, what the family might want out of it. The term memorial service is one I don’t hear that much, except maybe like an obituary and the funeral home publishes, you know, a memorial service will be held at instead of the term funeral service.

It just seems like This might feel a little better but I am actually starting to see more funeral homes using the term celebration of life in obituaries 

Diane Hullet: as well. Interesting. And, and we, in celebrations of life, sometimes are before the person died and sometimes after the person died. And I hear that used sort of interchangeably too.

Shari Stern: Yeah. I mean, some people are using, are having sort of like one goodbye party while they’re living, which is, or some people call that a living funeral. I have not been engaged in a funeral. in living funerals, but I do know that is something that is increasingly being done if people want to do it, which is great.

Diane Hullet: Yeah. Kind of the idea of like, let’s bring everyone together. Let’s say all that needs to be said, let’s spend time and we can do that before you die, depending on what the person wants. Well, I think maybe part of the takeaway for listeners is just, this is a moving. Shifting landscape and you have some autonomy and authority over an advocacy over what you want or what your loved one wants, which I think is kind of neat that it’s coming back like that to families chosen families, biological families, however, they come together and and funerals are officiated by typically like a funeral director or religious leader.

Or how does someone like you come in? So 

Shari Stern: I think technically they can. You can have a celebration of life ceremony and you can have your cousin do it. I would not recommend that. I know that this is that is something becoming more popular. Let’s say in weddings where you ask your good friend to, you know, sign up and do what they have to do so they can marry you.

A celebration of life or a funeral is very different. The energy is different. I did go through a certification program through the CFNI. It was intensive, six months of training, a lot of homework, a lot of projects. I was very prepared. They did a great job preparing me and my classmates. You know, for this process and holding space.

I mean, I think the difference between working with a celebrant or somebody like me is I invest a lot more time and energy to get to know the family. And by the time I’m done with all the interviews that I do and putting together and thinking creatively and sort of using my instincts to sort of understand, The person who passed, I feel like they’re a friend.

I feel like I know them so intimately. One, this one guy in particular, I was going through a personal rough time and I found myself talking to him. It’s, it becomes very personal. And then. So if you work with maybe like a more traditional ceremony with the religious figure or the funeral director, they most likely don’t have as much time to craft a custom experience and get to know the person.

So their ceremonies might be a little bit more uniform. Like this is, you know, They just piggyback off of their standard process. Sometimes they tend to leave more of it’s just, I guess the term could be cookie cutter. I don’t, I don’t mean to put it that coldly. That’s not what I mean, but you know, they do their process and then a family comes up and does eulogies and that’s the only integration of personalization.

Diane Hullet: So it’s like, here’s some different readings we can choose from. Here’s some different songs. What do you think? And then the family members are the ones who speak to the person’s life story. Whereas you’re really talking about a, a fullness of integration of, of how that person’s memory can be brought in.

That’s, that’s a really cool distinction. I, I have been to a funeral where I kind of leaned over to my husband and very quietly said, if. If you do a funeral like this for me, I will haunt you because I did not like the way it was going. And he was like, gotcha. So yeah, there’s people have different opinions about how they want to go.

And some people do want a very straight, very traditional, possibly a religious ceremony with really known factors to it. And some people want more of their own story woven in. I, you who worked with my In laws and my husband and I, she was so beautiful. And I remember her saying, well, a good ceremony has an arc to it.

And I was just fascinated. I was like, what do you mean by the arc? So tell us like, not, not your recipe, but like, what is the arc that makes a good a good service that’s meaningful, that touches people and leaves them wanting more. 

Shari Stern: So the chaplain was spot on. I just want you to know that is a big part of the training that I went through is developing that arc.

So the way that I started, I really feel it’s important for everyone to feel welcome. So. In a ceremony, this person likely had many chapters of their life, and there’s people in the room who hold, you know, a very loving space, and there might be other people in the room, there might be ex spouses, there might be some estranged family, friends who lost touch for many years, you know, over the years, Chapters of even the most amazing person’s life.

There’s, there’s bumps. It’s just life. It’s just the fact of life, right? So how do we hold space for all people to feel invested? In the ceremony. So that’s the that’s the beginning. And then from there, there’s admittedly kind of like a build up. So usually after that, like a reading or some music, usually it’s a reading to kind of launch that, followed by a eulogy.

Somebody’s, you know, I’ll have somebody come up and And do a, you’ll usually there’s multiple speakers. Now, if the person, the family wants some religious elements, I’m not, you know, I’m not a minister. I’m not a rabbi. I’m not a priest. So if they want some Psalms or, or religious passages read, I will ask somebody to come up from the family and handle that.

Usually it’s very meaningful for them. So it works best anyway. So the big buildup is usually. The most impactful eulogy at that point, usually it’s the surviving spouse, a child, a best friend. And at that point, you know, the, the emotions are high. There’s been a lot of smiles. There’s been a few tears. So there’s a lot of vulnerability at this point.

And then here comes like, Just the stunning story. Usually it’s a stunning story and heartfelt experiences. So that’s, that’s the top of the arc usually. And then I have to hold that space to bring everybody down, not be down, but to like, bring it, you know, I got to conclude the ceremony. So usually at that point, a momentous of reflection is really key.

So allow everybody to catch their breath, take a moment, and then usually followed by a song, like a music. I, musicians are so vital to ceremonies I’m finding. That’s, that’s, we can talk more about that in a little bit, but music is very important. And then I have, you know, then I usually do a wrap up.

Yeah. 

Diane Hullet: Wow. Beautiful. I love, it’s like the idea is that people have come together on that day for an experience. And so your job is to kind of hold that experience and bring them somewhere. I, I remember one relative, it was very beautiful. It was kind of reflecting and, you know, they said, well, I don’t know if we can really do, you know, country music and classical piano.

And the person who was guiding it helped us figure out like, yeah, we can have classical piano when people come in. And that kind of sets this tone of taking them out of ordinary life into sacred time, right? So here’s this beautiful song playing that can do that. But then in the middle of it, there can be a favorite country song that was beloved by the couple.

And to me, there was this beauty to that ceremony because it really held more than just a straightforward expectation. It was kind of surprising that there was, you know, this country duet in the middle of things, and yet it was perfect for who that person was. So speaking to that kind of personalization, as you’re saying, of this arc and giving the audience the participants an experience.

Shari Stern: Yeah, it is an experience. And then bringing into the, actually, I’m going to circle back to music for a minute because music is very interesting. So one thing I do find is most families they, they have the music that they, They want, I always change your music choices because it’s usually not appropriate for the ceremony part.

Now we can play that song after when people are mingling, sometimes there’s some food and it’s totally appropriate. Then with that emotional arc, I have to be very careful that I’m balancing that energy. People sometimes think. Oh, they, you know, funeral, you know, songs that are about a funeral or somebody passing, or this one Box of Rain, where the Grateful Dead wrote in honor, for the funeral of a friend, and they went that played, but that is actually not the right song.

Anything that reminds, You have a funeral or, or, or strong death. Now, symbolism is usually more appropriate. And luckily my world has a lot of music in it. So I end up, once I’m interviewing the family and friends and really getting to know the person, it just like, I do a bit of research. It comes to me and I, so some songs that are great.

 A lot of families do like to integrate, like you were saying, some traditional gospel songs, like I’ll fly away is a great one. Amazing grace is another one, you know, and it’s, that’s really good for families where you need a balance of religious element and or less religious elements. So sometimes, you know, let’s say a family member is very religious and they want that religious element, but the person who passed was not.

And people think that that is not. reflective of what they would have wanted. So that, you know, music is very important and, you know, working with a celebrant and somebody like me, we will do the best we can to integrate that appropriately. 

Diane Hullet: I love the idea of almost kind of trusting. Like when my husband and I got married, the minister said, now, just so you know, in the middle of it, I’m going to read a poem that I’m not going to tell you about ahead of time.

But But trust me, it’s beautiful. And, and that was kind of lovely to have this element of surprise for us that, that wasn’t exactly, you know, something we had laid out and managed completely, but this lovely element that we could just open to and listen in that moment. So I think what you’re saying like that is like, how do you trust your celebrant and go back and forth and give them some ideas, but see what they think integrates the experience as a whole.

Shari Stern: Yeah. And. I am dealing with families that are going through grief. In this case, I would not give them an element of surprise. So I make sure I run everything through them before it all goes. But in every case, it’s always been like, Oh yeah, that’s, that’s good. That’s right. So the good thing about celebrations or life and these customized experiences, these customized memories you’re almost like planning, you know, you’re planning an event.

There are so many micro decisions that have to be made while you’re doing this and for a family that’s, let’s say, a child or a spouse or a close friend that’s grieving, this could feel like a great project to distract them in planning the ceremony. But there always comes a point where there’s so many micro decisions to be made, it’s overwhelming and I step in and I just take it over.

I, you know, I’m waiting, it will happen. And I’m happy to do it. It’s hard, you know, you know, you’re dealing with, you’re working with people who are grieving and there’s so many emotions. So a celebrant or we’re working with somebody like a celebrant. We need to hold that space. 

Diane Hullet: Yeah, you’re like a celebrant, family mediator, therapist, counselor, minister, rabbi, you’re like the whole package.

Shari Stern: Yeah, I wouldn’t quite say therapist because that’s not, but I, I use the, actually I use the word like concierge, like it’s kind of like, you know, let me help direct this. 

Diane Hullet: Yeah. Yeah. So, so I love, so you’re really saying, you know, you’re saying that the arc matters, that what makes a ceremony meaningful is both Personalized to the person, appropriate for the person, whether that’s non religious or religious or secular or specific or parts of different religions, whatever sort of holds their truth and the family’s truth, and then Music is really a piece, and I’m sure words as well, poetry and passages.

Shari Stern: Yes, so I said the word music only because it seems like every ceremony I’ve done has been with musicians. But yes, but words, thank you. So, poetry and so forth. One thing I do want to call out is Funeral ceremonies are for the living, in honor of the person who have passed. So as much as someone might have detailed, these are the passages that I went read, this is the music that I went played.

If that does not resonate, then we can certainly read that passage at a different point, more in that context. You know, again, in the afterwards or, you know, some gathering, sometimes families just get together afterwards. So I know that there is a growing trend where people are very important to plan your end of life.

You know, get your passwords down, get details, you know, help your family manage your business. Give them an idea. I do, you know, I grew up in a religious community, but I do not want a religious based ceremony. That’s fine. But there’s no reason to get to nitty gritty because live your life so that your closest friends and family can represent you.

Diane Hullet: That’s beautiful. I love that. So kind of maybe you lay out some ideas. Like I encourage people to have like a folder that they can call like when I die and maybe throw some beautiful poems in there or things that are meaningful to you or ideas of music. But maybe you don’t have to be like, it’s an hour long ceremony.

And here’s the order of the speakers. You’re, you’re saying make a little space for the living to have their, imprint or their expression held in the ceremony. That makes sense to me. And balancing it out with somebody might have something they feel really strongly about sharing, but you’re saying more like, let people know that, have that conversation.

Shari Stern: Have that conversation. You know, if you love Grateful Dead music, play Grateful Dead music. You know, you know what I mean? In other words, don’t, you know, you just hope that you Live your life in a way so people can reflect the ceremony that you want, but funerals and end of life ceremonies are for the living about the person who passed away.

Diane Hullet: Yeah. Yeah. Say a little more about like, I hear a trend sometimes with people where they say, Oh, I don’t want to have a ceremony. Nobody do anything. Or sometimes things get very delayed. Like we’re going to celebrate mom in six months or next summer or something. Talk a little about the pros and cons of 

Shari Stern: that.

That’s a great question. So that can go off in many directions, but I find that there is a good reason to have formal ceremonies. Within a defined time now people might have extraneous reasons why they have to delay it and that’s fine. And I’m sure there’s reasons, but in general, like take, for example, there are religions that have guardrails around this and it’s for good reason.

 For example, in the Jewish religion, You must bury the body within 48 hours. There are rules around 7 to 10 days, the immediate family is taken care of by the community. They don’t do, you know, they are expected to stay home and friends and family take care of them. There’s rules around memorial prayers or, you know, and so forth in timing.

And then after one year, You have a final formal ceremony, small ceremony called the unveiling where the gravestone is unveiled, you know, and it’s almost like it’s been a year it’s, you know, it’s allowing that time to breathe and that process. And it’s really intended to help the living. You know what I mean? 

Now of course not, you know, within a year, not everyone’s ready to move on, but at least it’s, it helps provide structure for the living. And I do think that there in other religions have other elements like that. Maybe not exactly like that, but I thought this was a good example. There’s reasons for that.

I have done ceremonies where there was a, especially when there’s family that have moved in other parts of the country. So often that’ll be, there’ll be a ceremony you know, where that person was living, where their family is, but they might have like a lot of family and friends. You know, they live on the West coast, but so they’ll do another ceremony on the East, so cousins and childhood friends can attend.

And I would, you know, usually that’s done within a year’s time. Now. The reason for ceremony, a formal ceremony, because, you know, you can also do a thing like if, if this is someone who loved hanging out by the fire, you know, let’s see, do a bonfire and invite all your family and friends, you know, over and can share stories and laugh and cry together.

And that’s fantastic. But that’s not it. A formal ceremony. So with the arc, like we talked about, that conclusion is super important. I’ll tell you why. Think about a wedding ceremony. You’ve been to where the, I now pronounce you husband and wife. Or a baby naming ceremony where you receive a certificate or any sort of ceremony, transitional ceremony.

There is sort of like an announcement to the community of the state in the funeral. You know, usually I close a funeral with some sort of closing of light. So blowing out a candle in one case, I had. He was a huge, he was really into camping. So instead of using a candle, I opened and closed with a camping lantern turned it on and turn it off, which made everyone laugh.

And it was great, but it, but it’s something very final. When you close a ceremony, you’re sort of introducing the concept of this person has passed and now their memory is with you. And that’s heavy. That’s very heavy. And I do think that is helpful. 

Diane Hullet: Yeah, it, it, it marks something, doesn’t it? I love, there’s a Canadian death doula named Dr.

Sarah Kerr, and I’ve taken some workshops with her around ritual. And what she says is that ritual, it either, Makes known what is unknown or takes what is known and moves it the other direction. Not sure I’m saying that exactly right, but for example is, you know, when two people have a union that is deeply between the two of them and then they have a marriage.

It takes that private knowing and that truth of connection into a public sphere. And so I think a funeral is that same thing. It takes the truth of the person’s living, and then their having died, and it makes that known in a community way. And that’s just different than Not having that, or like you said, having it more informally.

And I think there’s all kinds of reasons people during COVID and before and after COVID didn’t do traditional typical funerals, right? Remember when funerals were becoming COVID super spreaders back in 2020. So there are good reasons that people have not been doing these kinds of formal ceremonies. But there’s something about just reflecting on why we do them.

And it has to do with this idea that. Ritual, which, which our dominant Western culture doesn’t have a ton of, but these rituals matter for our kind of humanity and for understanding what has happened and for it’s almost like catching our soul up to the reality of our body, you know, so we know that someone died.

Now we’re trying to catch ourselves up to that truth and really know it on all levels. Yeah, 

Shari Stern: yeah, for sure. It’s, it’s true. And. There’s many things that you can do after a formal ceremony to remember somebody. Like, I just got invited a friend of mine, her mother passed many years ago, but every year on her birthday, she invites a group of fun friends to a restaurant and it’s Chinese food.

That was her mother’s like favorite. and gather and bring lots of wine and eat Chinese food and say happy birthday to her mother. And I just think that is just stunning. Like absolutely. That’s great. I can’t wait for this. It 

Diane Hullet: makes so much sense. I think I’ve been thinking lately about how we can be still in relationship with our beloved dead friends and family.

So maybe the relationship isn’t over. It’s just changed in a lot of ways. Like in the hugest way possible, but but things like that, ceremonies like that, and bringing in joy and marking things like birthdays and death days, I think is really valuable to continue that relationship in some way. 

Shari Stern: Yeah. It helps you, you know, keeps their memory strong.

Yeah. 

Diane Hullet: I love the, the camping lantern example. Do you have any other kind of quirky examples of things you’ve done that are a little unusual? 

Shari Stern: Yeah. That’s like, it’s why I love this work. I just love the creative human side of what we do. When One ceremony that I did, this woman was, she was character. I mean, like, you know, again, I keep saying how much I just appreciate the people I’m memorializing as I get to know them through their stories.

But she she was an adventurer. She loved cross, she loved taking road trips. And she was also a huge animal lover. She was that person that she would, she had something like at 1. 17 stray cats, a whole bunch of birds, dogs, like rabbits. Like she just, any animal that looked hungry, she just took them in.

So her. She was living in California at the time but her, she’s from Philadelphia and she wanted her, she, she was cremated and she wanted her cremains buried with her family from Philadelphia. So we did a graveside ceremony and this was obvious, this was like at least six months after she died.

So, you know, they did something formal for California and then ended this here and the daughter and her partner drove cross country with the cremains and stopped her mother just had all these friends all over the country and stopped it like their mother’s friends houses and took her on a road trip.

I mean, that was kind of how they celebrate it. So they were like partying with her along the way and then buried parts of her cremains. At each of the homes they visited, her friend’s home. And then the, you know, what was the remaining was buried, but I just thought that was great. And then because she loved animals after we we took turns, like we helped bury her you know, the cremains with filling in with the dirt.

And then we, I brought bird seed. And we had, I had the family members spread birdseed on top of her grave site. That way she would not be alone and the birds would be with her. Beautiful. That was a good one. And then I heard another one. I was not at this one, but this woman shared it with me and I just love this one.

A woman, her mother. Died and the body was getting cremated. So the family went to the crematorium and the body was in a cardboard box. And friends and family just took markers and stickers and decorated the box and wrote these these messages. And it was just this beautifully decorated box that they, you know, they, it, they felt like they really supported her.

And I think they felt supported. It. You know, by doing this 

Diane Hullet: beautiful, beautiful, just this creativity and this like balancing the grief with joy and togetherness and creating this art project to center off in incredible. 

Shari Stern: I think that there is an element of nurturing there. So You know, during rituals, when somebody has passed, there’s a washing of the body ritual that is done in many cultures.

And a strong element of that is caring. You know what I mean? Like your last And I think that there is, through creativity, we can, we can take care of the person we loved. One, you know, one last time, or metaphorically, one last time. And I think that that, that’s healing. 

Diane Hullet: Yeah, I think so too. Whether it’s washing, anointing with scented oils, or placing flowers around the body and speaking with them, whatever it is that just takes a pause and names that time as sacred.

And that’s really a personal and private moment with the body. But I, I think it’s so important to make space around that, to not just rush it in the way that we kind of think we need to rush things these days. I always tell people when someone dies, you do not need to call 911. It’s not an emergency. You call 911.

Typically hospice or a doctor or a nurse, somebody does have to pronounce the, the time of death and so on. But it can be a quiet, sacred time. And then it can move into this, whether it’s a week later, two days later, six months later, sometime, a ceremony that holds meaning for those who are living. Well, Sherry, I appreciate your time so much.

And again, you can find out about Sherry at This is how my story ends. com, which I think is just such a beautiful name and she’s all over Instagram and you can follow her and see what she’s up to. Thank 

Shari Stern: you so much, Diane. This is fun. I appreciate talking to you. Oh, it’s 

Diane Hullet: just great. Thanks for joining me.

And you can, as always, find out about the work I do at bestlifebestdeath. com. Thanks for listening.