Cremation as a means of burial has become more and more popular in the South African context. This has prompted the question of a heathen origin or custom that has infiltrated the Christian tradition. The reasoning behind cremation becoming more popular is twofold, namely cost saving and space saving. Because of the silence of the Bible on the topic, the church has never taken an official stand on this matter. As a result of our belief on the state of the dead, cremation versus burial should not pose a problem. [1]“The God who created us, is equally capable of re-creating us from ashes of incineration or from ashes the result of slow decay. All things organic return to their basic elements, the real difference being only how long it takes. In fact, we do not hold that in the resurrection the new person will be composed of the same atoms of which he was previously formed. Atoms disperse and restoring the person is a matter not of reassembly of atoms but of expressing the creative power of God, whatever atoms are involved. We know also that every living person is a conduit for new atoms entering and old ones dispersing, so that to a large degree any person will be composed in 10 years of an almost entirely different set of atoms. The person remains in the mind of God, and through His creative power He will restore to what He wishes, even a new body untouched by the power of sin.”
Cremation should be an acceptable way of burial as we think of someone killed in a car accident and then burnt in the fire that starts as a result. Surely if such a person was a confessing Christian he will be in the Kingdom some day, just the same as a person that was buried. There seems to be no reason for doubting the credibility of cremation as a means of burial that one can find from the Scriptures. [2]”I recognize that to a few persons the matter of burial rather than cremation is important. They note that cremation is followed in pagan countries such as India and China. As a matter of fact these vastly overpopulated countries long ago confronted occupation of scarce fertile land by cemeteries, by imbedding in their religion a tradition of burning, this explained in terms of the purifying power of fire. Scientifically we see advantage in the prevention of infection. Most often death takes place in the presence of severe illness, and in most pagan countries death comes from infectious disease, not the degenerative conditions that plague us in the West. Of course we have absolutely no interest in pagan practices for their own sake, but when measured by our understanding of how God works, something like burning would create no problem. It is true that in Jewish tradition the dead always were buried, a custom written into Catholic canon law and thus perpetuated in the Christian community”.
In the light of the above, it is expedient that we allow each person to act as they are lead by their conscience. Burial and cremation should be suitable ways of burying our loved ones, hoping that they will be resurrected in the first resurrection at the appearing of Jesus.
[1] Pfandl, G.(BRI) E-mail, 2 March 2009.
[2] Ibid.
