Did you know you can choose your own funeral celebrant? It’s something most people don’t realise until they’re right in the middle of planning a funeral, usually while exhausted and grieving. So, I wanted to write this now, before anyone needs it.
Why this isn’t usually explained
Most of the time, this choice gets left to the funeral director. They’ll recommend someone from a small pool of celebrants they regularly work with, which is completely understandable, and those celebrants are usually lovely, capable people. But they might not be the person you would have chosen to tell your loved one’s story.
Funeral directors have an enormous amount to manage, and a trusted shortlist of celebrants is a sensible, practical way to handle that. But it does mean that, by default, the choice is often made for you rather than by you.
Why it matters
I’ll be honest; for some families, it won’t matter. They will literally just want to get through the funeral part as fast as possible, and they won’t have a preference. But sometimes, it does matter. For example:
- Maybe your loved one was part of the LGBTQ+ community, and you’d like someone who understands that experience from the inside to tell their story.
- Maybe you’ve lost someone to suicide, and you’d feel more comfortable with a celebrant who has lived experience of that kind of loss.
- Maybe your loved one was really alternative or lived a lifestyle you’d like to see reflected in your celebrant.
- Maybe your loved one’s life was shaped by an era that a much younger celebrant would only ever know second-hand. You might prefer someone who carries that history too, not just someone who’s read about it.
This isn’t to say that lived experience is the ultimate arbiter of whether or not someone will do an incredible job of supporting you, listening to you, turning your stories into a meaningful ceremony and delivering it beautifully on the day. An empathetic celebrant is able to put themselves into someone else’s shoes and develop an understanding of how they might have moved through and experienced the world – and they can capture how that person made others feel, which is so very important. But personal preferences exist – and it’s ok if you have them.
Choosing your own celebrant
If you have found a celebrant in your area that you would like to use, you can let your funeral director know and they will get in touch with them to see if they are available. Don’t worry about not using someone from their celebrant pool. If there’s a particular kind of person you want telling your loved one’s story – someone who shares their community, their history or their way of moving through the world – you’re entitled to look for them, and to say so.
As a funeral celebrant, what matters most to me is that you know you have a choice. Whether that choice is me or someone else entirely. I’d genuinely rather more people knew this and never needed me than didn’t know it at all.
If you’re planning a funeral and would like to learn more about working with me, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.
