Graveside Services
Some funerals at funeral homes in Monticello, FL will have a funeral service and a graveside service, while other funerals may have just a graveside service. Either type of funeral is acceptable, but people tend to have more experience with attending funeral services (which are usually held in the evening hours) than with attending graveside services (which are often held during the day).
Because people are more likely to attend funeral services than they are to attend graveside services, you may not know exactly what to expect at a graveside service.
A graveside service happens in the cemetery at the plot where the deceased person will be buried. This service is often very religious in tenor, but it is also much shorter than a funeral service or memorial service. This is because the graveside service’s purpose is to commit the de deceased person’s remains to the ground.
A graveside service is usually a much more intimate type of service than the funeral service because there are few people who attend it. A graveside service may also be a much more emotional service than the funeral service because it’s the family’s final farewell to their loved one.
While some families choose to have private graveside services, most graveside services are public, which means that anyone who would like to attend the graveside service can attend it.
Graveside services start at the funeral home. After the funeral service (or the morning after a nighttime funeral service), drivers who will be going to the graveside service get their vehicles in line for the funeral procession that will make its way from the funeral home to the cemetery.
The hearse will be the lead car in the funeral procession. The funeral procession will slowly take the deceased person to their place of final rest. If the cemetery is located next to the funeral chapel, then the mourners will slowly follow the family out to the burial plot.
A graveside service can be held for both the burial of a casket and for the interment of cremated remains (whether in a columbarium niche, a mausoleum, or in a cemetery plot). A clergy member will usually offer a prayer for the deceased person and a prayer for the family before the deceased person is interred.
Most cemeteries will wait until the deceased’s family has left the cemetery before they lower the casket into the burial plot, since the interment can be very difficult for the family to watch.
At a graveside service, the family of the deceased person always sits immediately in front of the casket. The funeral home will have chairs set up under a canopy, so once the deceased’s family is seated, other people can sit in the chairs behind them until they are full. Anyone else will stand during the graveside service.
Knowing what you should say to a bereaved family after a graveside service might be hard. Sometimes the family is allowed to leave the cemetery first, especially if there’s no reception planned, so you may not have a chance to speak with them at the graveside service.
But if there is a reception, express your condolences to the family before you leave the cemetery. Leave the cemetery in a dignified manner. Don’t arrive at the graveside service nor leave it with your music blaring and your bass thumping. If you do listen to the radio on the way to the cemetery, be sure to turn it off before you get to the cemetery.
If you want to know more about graveside services at funeral homes in Monticello, FL, our compassionate and experienced staff at Lifesong Funerals & Cremations can help.
