PORTCHESTER Crematorium lies within my parish. One of the busiest in England, it holds more than 100 funerals every week. Recently I met the Superintendent Registrar, James Clark, who told me that the majority of funerals there are now conducted by civil celebrants, while the number of services taken by the clergy diminishes each year.
At one level, we can complain that this is simply another sign of the secularisation of society and the marginalisation of the Church, but it could be more challenging than that: a sign of the inflexibility of the clergy, combined with pastoral and administrative inefficiency.
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