Funeral rites

Justin Welby Archbishop of Canterbury sermon on the crown funeral queen westminister abbey

The Archbishop of Canterbury’s Sermon on the Crown

September 20, 2022
Archbishop Cranmer
0 Comments

The funeral of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was always going to be a major televised event, and whoever preached the sermon at Westminster Abbey was always going to be gifted with the most awesome mission – quite literally –…

David Lammy and the anti-Empire racism of religious illiteracy

April 29, 2021
0 Comments

When it transpired recently that thousands of black and Asian soldiers who died fighting for the British Empire had been 'unequally' commemorated in death, the absence of headstones and other…

Church of England funerals plummet 30% in a decade

November 2, 2016
99 Comments

Are people living longer? Are fewer dying? In the decade 2005-2015, the general population increased from 60,210,000 to 64,716,000, so why has the number of Church of England funerals plummeted…

Cecil the Lion – a lesson in animal theology

July 30, 2015
261 Comments

A dentist called Walter Palmer has killed a lion called Cecil. Cecil the lion is now dead, and never has the world been so united in grief. Well, perhaps…

Horrible Histories meets Monty Python – the reinterment of King Richard III

March 23, 2015
431 Comments

According to Leicester Cathedral, the cost of designing a space to accommodate the tomb of King Richard III has been £1.54million. The cost of the reinterment events, interpretation and…

"What ceremony else?" Church of England to reform burial of suicides

January 7, 2015
145 Comments

"What ceremony else?" cries Laertes in Hamlet, as his dead sister Ophelia is buried to a single tolling bell with a meagre liturgy, as all suspected suicides used to…