A friend or family member has passed away and you have been asked to plan a memorial service. Perhaps your loved one does not belong to a church or the family wants a celebration instead of a sad funeral. Or perhaps the person was what is now called “spiritual, not religious.” That usually means that they believed in God in some way, but did not adhere to the religious dictates of any religion or church.

There are many ways to honor this life that you feel are not carried out in a church per se and are not administered by a person from the church. The key is the reverence and compassion that goes into planning, the personal details that are taken care of, and the respect and caring that goes into the celebration. Here are some things to help you think about what you want in a Celebration of Life event. Gather select family members and close friends and think about the following.

1. Decide how many people will come

If your loved one had tons of friends and business contacts, plan to have 100 or more. Ask one of your business associates what to expect from that aspect of the person’s life. How many relatives will come? If it is a person under 18 years of age, count on many more. If the person is in public life, try to estimate how many members of the public can attend. Getting an approximate number will help determine the size of the location you will need.

2. Select a warm and welcoming place.

Some ideas for a Celebration of Life event are the same as selecting a location for a wedding. Ideas for outdoor celebrations include gardens, parks, ocean beaches, state and national parks, and wineries. Inside ideas are grand houses, dance venues, clubhouses, bed and breakfasts, even hotel meeting rooms can be heated! Of course, everything has a cost, but it is convenient. Try to select a space that is not crowded, but is also not so large that the celebration is lost in space.

3. Decide on the date and time.

Selecting a weekend date allows people to come from out of town. If the person has requested to be cremated, the celebration can last up to a month or more. This allows time for preparation, deep reflection, preparation of slide shows, old photographs, etc. All of these take time and add a touch of love. The time of day depends on whether you are going to sit or eat cafeteria style or just have a snack and a drink.

4. Spread the word

One way to do this is to check the person’s email list and send out notices. Placing an “ad” in the appropriate newspapers, while not cheap, is a good way. Many people read obituaries every day. (Call your newspaper to check their rates.) Set up a phone tree calling 10-20 people in the person’s life (work, family, friends, social clubs, neighbors) and ask them to call the people they think will want murga.

5. Plan the meal

The easiest and least time-consuming way to do this is to have a vendor handle the food. Whether it’s hors d’oeuvres or a full meal, the provider will bring the food, the plates, the silverware, the bedding, even the tables, everything you need. At the end of the day, they take it all away. However, many people find it comforting to have a home cooking meeting the day before the celebration and work together to make preparations. Shared meals are also perfectly appropriate. For generations, friends and neighbors have provided food for the deceased’s family. We often like to do it. It makes us feel like we have helped in some way. So feel free to announce that it is a potluck.

6. make a decision about flowers and donations

Many people ask attendees not to bring flowers and to make a donation to a favorite charity of their choice or that was the favorite of the deceased. Since a decent bouquet costs over $ 50, this can be a real boon for the charity.

7. Select Decorations or a theme.

This isn’t always necessary, but since you’ll want to provide a schedule of some kind, flower arranging baskets, and note cards to drop off family condolences or place cards, you may want to create a color scheme to make the room look neat. . Cream and another color are usually a safe and tasteful option.

8. Decide on the content of the program

Select someone who is good with computer graphics to make your program. In addition to listing who will speak or act, you may want to include a favorite poem or saying, a meaningful sentence or graphic, or other things appropriate to your person. Think about the person’s nationality, culture, and interests to get clues about this. A simple creme colored 81/2 by 11 folded paper is easy. Depending on your time and resources, you may want to make it more elaborate.

9. Decide who will do what

On the day of the celebration, you will need the following roles performed by people you can trust to be accountable.

orHosts:

orMistress or Mistress of Ceremony:

orFour to six honors or memories:

orA person to circulate so that attendees can speak:

orCleaning equipment:

There are many well thought out ways to personalize a Celebration of Life event. A voracious and inveterate reading family brought out all their books and asked the participants to review them and take as many as they wanted. Attendees found it moving to have such an appropriate memory and selected those that had been abused and underlined, as well as those that still didn’t seem to have been read. The family designed a bookmark that matched their schedules and had a book quote.

Did your person have a passionate interest, a favorite hobby, or did they love a certain type of music or dance? Did he / she have a collection of something that no one in the family wants, but would having a piece be a good keepsake for the people who helped? A friend loved scarves and had over thirty scarves and coats, so they offered them to people.

Many churches accompany the family on informal celebrations and only have a couple of prayers, so you don’t have to discard them. If your loved one was not a regular church goer, they will likely be asked to pay some type of rent. But many churches are beautiful and give comfort to the religious in the family. One more thought. You may not want to have your celebration in a church, but you can still ask a minister, spiritual leader, or friend to say a prayer.

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