Grave matters

One major area of activity by the City Council touches upon people of all faiths and none at all - is bereavement services. Large areas of land, around Cardiff either owned, or managed by the Council on behalf of churches, are maintained in good order and kept open for burial of bodies or cremated remains, and visits by the bereaved.

Seven cemeteries are in use, plus Thornhill crematorium. This has two chapels and there are several other churches and cemetery chapels available for funeral ceremonies. Chinese, Muslim, Jewish and Greek Orthodox burial sections are available to members of those communities wishing to be buried together.

Everyone has the right to arrange funeral ceremonies according to their own wishes, or to have no ceremony at all. The City will make funeral arrangements on behalf of those who are destitute and without next of kin.

It is also possible to be buried on private land, although permission has to be obtained that involves consulting the City Planning Department, the Environment Agency and making an application to the Home Office.

On a darker note, the City’s action plan for managing a major emergency or disaster, such as would be implemented during a pandemic or an outbreak of war, caters not only for sick and injured, but also care of the bereaved, temporary storage of and disposal of the dead – a potentially difficult and complex operation. The best possible handling of a major crisis is vital for maintaining social cohesion and recovery.

Considering the thousands of people who die and are laid to rest each year in Cardiff, issues of contention arising to public awareness are few and far between. Any kind of mistake in the handling of dead bodies is extremely rare, due to the rigour of the administrative procedures involved. Occasionally regulations concerning memorials become a matter of controversy, largely due to changes in what the public regards as acceptable leaping ahead of convention.

Vandalism of memorials rightly makes the news whenever it happens. Given the cemeteries’ large land areas and boundaries, total security is almost impossible. The sanctity of a cemetery relies on public good-will, and suffers from a climate of indifference, as it would also suffer from neglect of maintenance. Churches whose graveyards are not Council maintained tend to suffer far more from neglect, because shrinking religious communities cannot afford their upkeep.

Difficulties in securing the funding to restore a dilapidated listed Victorian cemetery chapel in Cathays cemetery, may well reflect tension between conservation ideals and practical function in a full cemetery, with limited potential for additional interments.

It was designed for use in an era when the majority of the bereaved were Christian. What purpose does it serve in an age where only a fifth of the population as a whole has some sort of need to express any kind religious belief publicly? It’s doubtful that it would be worthwhile making it a faith-neutral sanctuary (like the renovated crematorium) in these change circumstances.

Altogether this is one area of excellence in public service which relies on sensitive partnership between local government, faith communities, and private enterprise – in this case companies providing funeral services and memorials. All together are challenged by social and cultural changes in practice that render the routine duty of disposing of the dead more complex than it has ever been.

Lewis Mumford’s master work 'The History of Cities' points out that when human beings were still nomadic, they established permanent places to house the bodies of their dead, and set up memorials to them. The necropolis, the city of the dead preceded cities of the living. But what is the role of the necropolis in this time of unprecedented mobility and the rise of the megalopolis? We are already seeing memorials to the dead speading far and wide in the form of roadside shrines, park benches, stone cairns on mountainsides. There are even memorial plaques mounted in the promenade decking of Penarth Pier, a venue also used for the unofficial disposal of cremated remains. Such changes challenge, not only religious communities, but also civil authorities charged with maintaining a social order which is acceptable to the majority of citizens.