Dead & Buried

This might seem like a lush prairie, but this field will soon be home to 100 dead bodies.

It's all part of a practice called Green Burial.

Natural or green burials are a burial practice that foregoes the process of embalming and the use of ornate caskets and headstones.

Now more than ever, there's a growing interest in the connection shared between humans and the earth we're buried in.

In one survey from 2022, almost 61% of people said they were interested in learning more about green burial options.

But this isn't a new idea.

Natural burial practices are thousands of years old.

So as curiosity moves towards these ancient and renewed burial practices, does that fundamentally change how we mourn?

Some cultures believe that the body should be returned to the Earth, and natural burials are a pathway to that return.

For example, in the Shoshone Bannock Tribes in Idaho, families care for an elderly loved one at home, and a natural burial after death is an extension of that care.

In Jewish burials, the body is buried as soon as possible to preserve the integrity of the body, while also allowing the soul believed to inhabit the body to return to God.

The traditional Islamic burial process begins with a ghusl or a washing of the body.

Eventually, the body is shrouded in a modest cloth.

In these burial practices, embalming is either banned or avoided as the body is meant to decompose naturally.

Modern embalming and many of today's funerary practices in the US did not arrive until the Civil War as soldiers died on the battlefield hundreds of miles away from loved ones.

Medics had to develop a way to preserve bodies long enough for their families to recognize them once they returned home.

In 1998, a shift happened, starting with likely the first US Green Cemetery in South Carolina.

Dr. Billy Campbell and his wife Kimberly initially opened Ramsey Creek Preserve as a way to save land.

I contacted Erica Xavier Beauvoir, a death doula and a natural burial consultant to dig a little deeper.

Green Natural Burials.

Indigenous burials allow for families to be active participants in the actual process of burying, tending, caring, cleaning.

You have more time.

You have more time with the body.

You have more time with that loved one.

You have more time to say things.

You have more time to give prayers and to caress and to create that that loving energy of the loved one going back into to earth.

I think people who want to leave Earth better than they found it are opting for environmentally friendly burial options.

Also, green natural burials tend to be less expensive than traditional burials.

If green natural burials don't have embalming cement vaults, high costs in casket, you are already probably saving a couple of thousand dollars in funeral expenses.

But what is it like to actually go through the process of a green burial?

This is Pamela Becker after her husband, Pat Becker, was diagnosed with cancer.

They researched their options and decided on a green burial together.

You know, it's always hard to bring up, but it's like, you know, come on, honey, we're going to figure this out.

What do you want to do?

Do you want to be cremated?

His parents had been cremated, so I always thought maybe he'd follow that path.

And he said, I do not want to be cremated.

I'm like, Oh, okay.

So we don't want to be buried here.

And we don't want to be.

Okay, what's left?

I just started frantically researching and came across an article about Emily Miller at the Colorado Burial Preserve about this new movement called Green Burial.

And I thought, wow, that's fascinating.

So, wow, I started looking into that.

What was it that stood out to you?

So I didn't know it was anything that existed, except maybe in a few rare places.

But I found out that Colorado is one of those few places that's just starting to allow it.

And Emily was just embarking on her journey, and I found this article and I ended up just giving her a call, and it just sounded so peaceful and serene.

And then so we planned a trip to go out there to see her place eventually, you know, Pat found the spot that he wanted, but it just made sense.

And he's just a simple man.

He was a carpenter.

So once the process is complete, do you find that the the whole green burial helped with your grieving process?

Definitely.

It just felt natural and pure and and perfect and beautiful.

And now I'm going to cry.

It's okay.

It's just I got so much confirmation from my kids.

And then when I was 40, what I wanted and there's something super secret, I think, about kind of going back to where we come from and where we are all going, right, which is back into the earth.

Essentially.

I had an epiphany when we were walking on the land together, went looking for his spot.

I'm like, you know, I'm just going to get a spot too, so I'll know where I'm going to be.

And so I'll be right next to him when my time comes and the kids will know what to do with me and taken care of.

So I'm truly just super moved to emotion, just hearing you and just speaking to you and speaking about Pat and his journey.

Essentially, my grandmother, who was like when my best friend just passed like two months ago and I feel you and we feel them and they're here and they're with us, you know?

So I'm just I want to I want to thank you for sharing something so vulnerable and I know that that's not easy to speak about it.

So thank you so much for hanging with us and talking about it.

This conservation burials like the Colorado burial preserve expand the idea of a green cemetery by connecting both humans and wildlife.

Sarah Womble, a licensed funeral director and co-founder of Campo de Las Vegas, is working to preserve and restore the environment before it disappears.

Recently, company surveyors pursued ways to connect natural burials with land conservation.

Greenburgh really has the potential to help protect and preserve land by one, dedicating a space specifically for protected burials so that no further development can be done on this specific spot of land.

In addition to that, the actual body being in the soil is also good.

You know, it biodegrade.

So we're removing all of that additional material that is typically put into the ground that can cause, you know, further degrading of the soil, water runoff and in areas seepage of chemicals into the soil.

And so for removing all of that, and we're just putting in our own bio bodies, bio presence into the soil, we're just getting back to it.

And we also bury bodies shallower than what is traditionally expected, where they're buried three feet deep rather than the traditional six feet.

I think a body buried in a three feet deep grave rather than a six feet deep grave means that it's going to be in the part of the soil where the microbial activity is actually taking place and can break down the body more quickly so that it can become part of the landscape and the plants and a benefit to the animals around it.

Today, a couple of days rest protects about ten acres of land.

Well, it may be one of only a handful in Texas.

Currently, there are some 220 natural burial cemeteries in the US, with a select few designated as conservation ground burial sites that specifically aim to restore the natural habitat.

But what if humans could become the soil itself?

This is a fairly new process called human composting or soil transformation.

Companies like Earth Funeral Return Home and recompose are working on an alternative to burials and cremation.

The body is transformed into soil from their families, can choose how much they'd like to keep and the rest is used for land restoration and developing forests.

But not everyone is a fan of this idea.

In New York, the state's Catholic conference pushed back against a Senate bill that passed the state legislator in 2022.

The bill permits the composting of human remains.

So now New York is poised to be the sixth state to approve human composting.

Joining Washington, Colorado, Oregon, Vermont and California for the U.S. Catholic Bishops Committee.

Human composting is a departure for the more appropriate form of burial.

They believe that every human is made in God's image.

And since people are a unity of body and soul, respect for the person includes respect for the body.

On the other hand, some people believe composting follows the scriptures, notes that we are dust to dust.

In their beliefs, the body is meant to return to earth in order to return to God.

And through this process, human composting fulfills that need with these opposing views.

Green burial practices like human composting pose new concerns when the human body is broken down into dirt and soil.

What can truly be considered human life?

And who is at liberty to decide which practices are better?

With mounting pressure from climate change and ecological issues.

Are we obligated to find more sustainable burial options?

In the end, we may not be able to control how we die, but the methods of burials and how we say goodbye to our loved ones are continuing to evolve.

Families like the Beckers are showing a growing interest in a simple natural burial that reconnects them with the Earth.

With growing concerns from religious groups, cemetery owners, and those that wish to maintain traditional funeral customs, it may be some time before green burials become the new norm.

What do you think?

Tell us in the comments.