Course Outline

The course has three parts. You work through seven reading parts before you arrive. The two days are then spent on discussion, practice and the eulogy, the things that only work in a room.

Before you arrive

Seven parts, about four hours in total, due the Friday before. There is a workbook to print and write in, and one short form to send us.

1. The rules where you will serve Who regulates funeral service where you live, what must be disclosed, how cremation and pre-need are handled.
2. Your own experience What you are carrying, before you sit with someone else’s loss. The one part we ask you to send us.
3. The state of the profession Cremation rates, religious affiliation, and the numbers behind why celebrants exist.
4. Dress and deportment The baseline standard, what to avoid, and what to do when a family asks for something different.
5. When the family is difficult The situations that recur, and what to do about each of them.
6. From condolences to committal The full arc of a service, in the order it happens.
7. Being found Funeral homes, families, what to charge, and why you should never lead with your title.

Day one

9:00 AM to 2:00 PM Eastern, with two breaks.

• Introductions. Seven questions, every answer spoken aloud. You will know the questions before you arrive.
• How we got here. The crossroads. Who is standing there now, how they arrived, who used to be there instead, and what changed. Wayne and Rosanne were leading funerals before this was a profession. The first time they offered, the answer was “we have lots of retired clergy.” No one says that now, and understanding why is the foundation of everything else. The longest discussion of the two days.
• Talents over title. No one once asked why the same person led the wedding and then the funeral. The split into separate professions was made by the market, not by the work. The distinction is not in what we do, it is in who we serve. You will draft the sentence you would use with a funeral director, and the room will work on it.
• The intake. Motivation, meeting, mandate and methods. The question bank, and what to do when a family gives you almost nothing.
• Crafting the service. Family, flow and flexibility, worked through with traditional and contemporary scripts in front of you.
• The story, told once. A life told the way a family tells it, in one sitting, with notes taken live. This is what you write from tonight.

Overnight

You write a eulogy. Nothing is submitted. You bring it to the next morning.

Day two

9:00 AM to 2:00 PM Eastern. The afternoon is the eulogies and nothing else.

• What the writing was like. Where it stalled, what surprised you, what you struggled to put into words.
• Questions from the seven parts. Difficult families, condolences to committal, dress. We talk through what you read and what still concerns you.
• Membership, resources and renewal. What happens in the week after, what your first year includes, and what keeps your certification current.
• The eulogies. Every participant delivers to the group on camera, and we work through each one together. What landed, what did not, and the one change that would make it better. See the eulogy project.
• What happens now. Your survey, your agreement, your certificate and your listing in the public register.