A church member's mother died recently and he showed me the itemized funeral cost list. It was obscene. The expenses were over $2000.00 before the casket was purchased or the cemetery plot. There were things such as $1350.00-professional services, $250-cosmetics, $495-viewing room, $525-embalming etc., etc. Funeral expenses is one of the biggest rip-offs of the public that's out there. Caskets that cost $300-$500.00 wholesale being sold for $3000.00. I would like to see a "Methodist Burial Society"; i.e. where we would pool our resources to start a funeral business who's primary motive is not the bottom line. Give our members a decent burial at a reasonable cost. What do you folks think. My degree is in psychology and I'm an organist. But I get so angry when I see our people being ripped off by funeral directors that I'm tempted to go to mortuary college.

-- Anonymous, July 15, 2004

Answers

Please be advised that the itemized statement of goods and services from the funeral home who performed the services spoke for itself.

Funeral expenses can be contained but often we waith until a person dies to make the final arrangements.

Casket Costs: A casket can be purchased from other souces thatn the funeral home that cas been contacted to handle the arrangments.

Many locally owned funeral homes are capable of giving a decent burial at a reasonable cost.

Check out the expense of attending mortuary college. You'll be surprised.

Check out the cost of begining a Funeral Establishment. You will be shocked.

There are cost saving suggestions that my wife and I make to families. We encourage families to shop around for prices.

Expesnive: Check out the cost of a grave, and a monument.

TRUE STORY: There is $ 10,000 worth of life insurance and the beneficary insturcts the funeral director to use all of the proceeds for the family does not want to receive one cent from the Life Policy.

I was contacted by a family six months ago. There was $10,000 worth of Insurance. The man dying of cancer instructed me to donate his remains to a Medical School. The $ 9750.00 remaining after the Insurance Company paid our Funeral Home its $ 250 Charge, went to his widow.

If you were in Tennessee, then we would show you in black and white the various options available to you. Recenltly, a woman asked me about the cost of burying her father. I handed her a complete binder. Her response was this is a blessing. "He does not have much". When GOD calls her father from labor to reward then all things are taken care of at a reasonable price.

Be Blessed! WHS

-- Anonymous, July 15, 2004