Sampling of HFP's Legal, Practical & Holistic Content
LEGAL EDUCATION
PRACTICAL EDUCATION & TRAINING
HOLISTIC EDUCATION & TRAINING
BODY:
MIND & EMOTIONS:
HEART-SPIRIT-SOUL:
ENVIRONMENT:
Don speaks (from his pioneering work as former Canadian Outreach Director for the North American
Green Burial Council) on topics such as:
those wanting to experience the sovereignty, empowerment and healing which comes from reclaiming family and community-led deathcare. Whether you choose to 'do it yourself', with a compassionate 'deathcaring' guide and/or a funeral director/transfer service for a 1-3 day, hybrid home funeral vigil © the 'culture' is yours to create! The only caveat I ask as an educator is you obey provincial statutes/laws, and practice necessary, universal health precautions.
The Practicum is 100% funeral director friendly for it is understood without their formal training and 24/7 availability, we cannot be fully secure. Also some deaths are fraught with complexities and some tasks too difficult to perform without their assistance.
Please know besides nurturing the Canadian Home Funeral Practicum and affiliated HFPracticum
Deathcaring Circles it is my greatest privilege to support the seriously ill, the dying, their families and friends as a steady companion.
I am available for staging hosted 1-3 day Home Funeral Practicums across Canada along with qualified workshop leaders. I am also open to teaching in the United States.
Thank you for visiting the Canadian Home Funeral Practicum site! I hope we'll meet some day!
Cheers,
Don
ps: for a fascinating read re: an academic's investigation into home funeral vigils see: Alexa Hagherty's pdf.
© HFP 2018
LEGAL EDUCATION
- You'll understand your legal rights to reclaim family and community-led deathcare.
- You'll grasp provincial/financial boundaries* if helping someone other than family or friends as a compassionate guide after death. (*No one other than a licensed funeral director or embalmer can receive money/renumeration for providing post death bodycare in Canada. If this boundary is crossed we risk what American funeral industry lobbyists have accomplished in 10 states: the outlawing of the public's legal right to act in lieu of a commercial funeral director).
- You'll understand procedures/logistics to obtain, properly complete and file all documentation including a transport permit and permit for burial or cremation in each Canadian province.
PRACTICAL EDUCATION & TRAINING
- You'll receive mock training in moving, lifting, turning a 'deceased' (as funeral directors & transfer services do) including use of a body board for navigating steps, hallways and doors inside and outside a home.
- You'll receive 'conservative', highly respectful training in undraping/draping/cleansing a mock 'deceased.' 'Trade' techniques for dressing, casketing, and cosmetic application as well instruction in securing a casket into a vehicle in accordance with provincial regulations and plain olde common sense!
- You'll learn of transmittable diseases; grasp/practice universal health precautions including safe disposal of bio-hazard waste to protect everyone's health.
- You'll be encouraged to forge relationships with local funeral directors, transfer service folks, vital statistics registrars, and compassionate end-of-life guides and where possible, medical examiners.
- You'll be supported to connect your heart and will forces to perform a legal, family or community-led, home funeral vigil whether by yourself or with a funeral director or transfer service for a 'hybrid' home funeral vigil.
HOLISTIC EDUCATION & TRAINING
BODY:
- You'll gain experience cleansing a live model's bathing suit covered body.
- Be guided through the ancient Jewish orthodox, religious purification ritual the Tahara which provides great comfort to the family and friends and provides dignity and honour to a deceased. Afterwards you'll deconstruct the Tahara and reconstruct a personalized ritual that meets your own cultural and spiritual needs.
MIND & EMOTIONS:
- Practice saying goodby to 'the dying mock model' offering forgiveness and blessings reminiscent of medieval European practices. (optional)
- Learn through group discussion and teachings from Don's well of experience ways to face and overcome fears of being present to, touching, cleansing, and caring for a deceased loved one.
- Discuss and practice the ancient custom of reading sacred texts to a mock deceased. (optional)
HEART-SPIRIT-SOUL:
- We'll discuss our ongoing relationship/connection to our late loved ones/ancestors.
- Receive instruction in 'boundary creation/psychic hygiene' when in the presence of the 'dead.'
- Practice devotional singing while 'preparing' a model. (An opportunity to experience 'palpable love').
ENVIRONMENT:
Don speaks (from his pioneering work as former Canadian Outreach Director for the North American
Green Burial Council) on topics such as:
- How to reduce one's carbon footprint in burial or cremation.
- The three categories of green burial fashioned by the Green Burial Council.
- How to create a private family, or public green burial cemetery.
those wanting to experience the sovereignty, empowerment and healing which comes from reclaiming family and community-led deathcare. Whether you choose to 'do it yourself', with a compassionate 'deathcaring' guide and/or a funeral director/transfer service for a 1-3 day, hybrid home funeral vigil © the 'culture' is yours to create! The only caveat I ask as an educator is you obey provincial statutes/laws, and practice necessary, universal health precautions.
The Practicum is 100% funeral director friendly for it is understood without their formal training and 24/7 availability, we cannot be fully secure. Also some deaths are fraught with complexities and some tasks too difficult to perform without their assistance.
Please know besides nurturing the Canadian Home Funeral Practicum and affiliated HFPracticum
Deathcaring Circles it is my greatest privilege to support the seriously ill, the dying, their families and friends as a steady companion.
I am available for staging hosted 1-3 day Home Funeral Practicums across Canada along with qualified workshop leaders. I am also open to teaching in the United States.
Thank you for visiting the Canadian Home Funeral Practicum site! I hope we'll meet some day!
Cheers,
Don
ps: for a fascinating read re: an academic's investigation into home funeral vigils see: Alexa Hagherty's pdf.
© HFP 2018