Memorial Service for an Atheist

There is, even for godless liberals, heathens and us evil atheists a need and benefit for the living of a ceremonial recognition of life's major events. Religion has so thoroughly inveigled itself into these human matters that it is now difficult to envisage ceremonies without a priest, rabbi or imam running the show it is important that alternatives become available. It is no accident that religion has commandeered all these emotional points in peoples lives. The solemnity and dignity of these occasions assists in the spreading the idea to those who must participate, especially children. Of course everyone is involved at some stage or another, ensuring all get exposed to this organised coercion to believe while emotionally vulnerable.

So this is a starting point for those who need to plan a memorial ceremony, or a funeral proper. The time to consider doing such planning is now - not when the emotion and pressures of having lost a loved one is upon you. At that time you will be least well equipped to avoid just doing the traditional thing, perhaps under pressure from well meaning family and friends who understand less than you the deceased views on a life free of a fear of a vengeful God.

The formal part of a memorial gathering would normally be between half to two hours, and an informal gathering following. Choose a length, consider an appropriate venue and then choose form a selection of suggestions. I hope that readers will contribute ideas that they find appealing so that others who are having to create such an occasion can benefit from these ideas.

A non-religious reflection on death

Readings of poetry and prose

Reminiscences about the dead person

One or several eulogy which is just a talk focussing on the life of the dead person, and the meaning of their life.

Rituals might include:

Candle lighting, sharing reminiscences with the people alongside you

Moments of silence and reflection.

Formal words of goodbye

A period of silence and meditation that can be used for private prayer for those that attend who may hold religious beliefs.

A few other things to consider before hand. Will there be a short video, has the deceased left any messages, are photos going to be part of the occasion - these will impact venue and any requirement for audio visual gear. Who will be invited to do a eulogy - will there be more than one ? If so consider the timing given to each and seek eulogy speakers early to give them time to consider their thoughts

From Richard Dawkins

"We are going to die, and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they are never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place but who will in fact never see the light of day outnumber the sand grains of Sahara. Certainly those unborn ghosts include greater poets than Keats, scientists greater than Newton. We know this because the set of possible people allowed by our DNA so massively outnumbers the set of actual people. In the teeth of these stupefying odds it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here.

Here is another respect in which we are lucky. The universe is older than 100 million centuries. Within a comparable time the sun will swell to a red giant and engulf the earth. Every century of hundreds of millions has been in its time, or will be when its time comes, 'the present century.' The present moves from the past to the future, like a tiny spotlight, inching its way along a gigantic ruler of time. Everything behind the spotlight is in darkness, the darkness of the dead past. Everything ahead of the spotlight is in the darkness of the unknown future. The odds of your century's being the one in the spotlight are the same as the odds that a penny, tossed down at random, will land on a particular ant crawling somewhere along the road from New York to San Francisco. You are lucky to be alive and so am I.

We live on a planet that is all but perfect for our kind of life: not too warm and not too cold, basking in kindly sunshine, softly watered; a gently spinning, green and gold harvest-festival of a planet. Yes, and alas, there are deserts and slums; there is starvation and racking misery to be found. But take a look at the competition. Compared with most planets this is paradise, and parts of Earth are still paradise by any standards. What are the odds that a planet picked at random will have these complaisant properties? Even the most optimistic calculation will put it at less than one in a million.

Imagine a spaceship full of sleeping explorers, deep-frozen would-be colonists of some distant world. Perhaps the ship is on a forlorn mission to save the species before an unstoppable comet, like the one that killed the dinosaurs, hits the home planet. The voyagers go into the deep-freeze soberly reckoning the odds against their spaceship's ever chancing upon a planet friendly to life. If one in a million planets is suitable at best, and it takes centuries to travel from each star to the next, the spaceship is pathetically unlikely to find a tolerable, let alone safe, haven for its sleeping cargo.<

But imagine that the ship's robot pilot turns out to be unthinkably lucky. After millions of years the ship does find a planet capable of sustaining life: a planet of equable temperature, bathed in warm starshine, refreshed by oxygen and water. The passengers, Rip van Winkles, wake stumbling into the light. After a million years of sleep, here is a whole new fertile globe, a lush planet of warm pastures, sparkling streams and waterfalls, a world bountiful with creatures, darting through alien green felicity. Our travellers walk entranced, stupefied, unable to believe their unaccustomed senses or their luck.

As I said, the story asks for too much luck; it would never happen. And yet, isn't it what happened to each one of us? We have woken after hundreds of millions of years asleep, defying astronomical odds. Admittedly we didn't arrive by spaceship, we arrived by being born, and we didn't burst conscious into the world but accumulated awareness gradually through babyhood. The fact that we gradually apprehend our world, rather than suddenly discovering it, should not subtract from its wonder."

We privileged few, who won the lottery of birth against all odds, how dare we whine at our inevitable return to that prior state from which the vast majority have never stirred?

Well, as a devout atheist I want this quote from Bertrand Russell read at my funeral. "I believe that when I die I shall rot, and nothing of my ego will survive. I am not young and I love life. But I should scorn to shiver with terror at the thought of annihilation. Happiness is nonetheless true happiness because it must come to an end, nor do thought and love lose their value because they are not everlasting. Many a man has borne himself proudly on the scaffold; surely the same pride should teach us to think truly about man’s place in the world. Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cosy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendour of their own."

Some links to other potential resources:

For the environmentally minded

What a wonderful world

There is no Tomorrow

For the cosmology minded

Earth from space 

Pale Blue Dot

Galaxy Song

A bit of both

For the stories of people

Human Origin

European History by Sand Painting

And for those that want to rag on religion on such an occasion

Tim Minchin's Religion

Music Usually a very personal choice, often around the deceased favourite or material that somehow embodies the life and times of the person. Be creative - there is no shame in laughter at a funeral.

Always Look on the Bright Side of Life - from Life of Brian

True Blue for an Aussie friend - John Williamson

We didn't start the fire - Billy Joel

Websites

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2010/02/14/resources-for-an-atheists-funeral/

http://richarddawkins.net/articles/350

http://secularseasons.org/celebrations/funerals.html

http://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/10538.Carl_Sagan

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Daniel_Dennett

http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/atheism/ritesrituals/funerals.shtml

Interested in your thoughts on this...