USCCB Statement:
https://www.usccb.org/news/2023/us-bishops-doctrine-committee-issues-statement-proper-disposition-bodily-remains
https://www.usccb.org/resources/On Proper Disposition 2023-03-20.pdf
Transcript:
All right, we’re going to North Carolina now. Laura’s in North Carolina watching on YouTube. Laura, go ahead with your question for Joe Heshmeyer.
Thank you. Say Joe, speaking of a celebrity, private jets and environmental impact, I recently heard from the owner operator of an aquamation facility near where I live, that this process returns more bone dust for collection than does cremation. So my question is at this time, how does the Catholic church look upon aquamation as final prep of the body for burial? That’s a really good question. So for those who aren’t familiar with aquamation, they use, I believe an alkaline solution to break down the body. And so it’s a little bit like the way, it means slightly similar to how cremation works, only instead of using fire, using chemicals and water, to break the body down into its constitutive parts. And it’s like 200 to 300 degree water and well, solution.
And so the advantages that it’s proclaimed as having are relative to cremation, that more of the physical remains of the body are preserved. You know, then they’re preserved in a similar manner as cremated remains.
And it’s less like environmentally destructive. Like there’s less fossil fuel and everything else. And so people who are worried about kind of the carbon footprint, this is one way that it’s kind of advertised to reduce that with.
Aquamation to my knowledge, it is so new as a technology that I’m not aware of anything the church has said directly on it. I would say all of the caution surrounding cremation would apply here as well, which is that the church has historically resisted previously completely opposed, but now just strongly kind of discourages cremation on the grounds that you don’t want to do anything that upsets the dignity of the body. So to put it as simply as I can. Oh, I’m sorry. Apparently in March 2023, the USCCB explicitly said, “Aquamation does not show adequate respect for the human body or hope in the resurrection.” And that was exactly what I was going to say. That’s the concern is how is the body being handled? And certainly the way I’ve seen Aquamation advertised is a return to nature. And that’s the opposite of kind of the Catholic vision. Now, I mean, to be sure, I don’t want to guess opposite is too strong of a word. From dust you are made into dust you shall return. But the Christian hope is that that’s not the end of the story. And so a method of handling the body that treats it as just biological waste or treats it as just something to go back into the earth. And that’s it.
That doesn’t do justice to the Christian vision. It’s for this reason that you wouldn’t say bury a person without a casket or preparing the corpse or anything like this or, you know, refuse to bury them at all.
Those kind of things would be contrary to the idea that you will rise again on the last day. And so while we recognize that in the bodily resurrection, you’re not tied to your genes or you’re not tied to your atoms, even as you are right now, like right now you have a physical body and yet that physical body has skin cells that may shed new cells that multiply and grow and all of this. So you’re not just a collection of cells, even at a bodily level, even right now. That’s true when your body is separated from your soul and death.
But nevertheless, anything that appears like the body is just being discarded is contrary to the Christian vision of the body. And so we resist and oppose it kind of on those grounds.
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