Episcopal Church creates a new platform to sell religious funeral services globally
The outbreak of corona in Washington made the area one of the first to realize the need to move to services online. While many churches understood that standard services needed to continue, one group became especially aware that also funeral services needed to be made available online as well.
Creating religious virtual funeral services
Washington was one of the first places to outright ban on funeral services. And a death in the St. Luke’s Episcopal Church community in Renton, Washington, put the stress on the facility to try and have an offering available to help the grieving families.
After a lot of work, starting this week, the organization has now developed a streamlined platform for designing and organizing online funerals globally. Starting at $750.00 families will have Rev. Kevin Pearson perform a 30-minute service. They can select the readings, but they have to pay an extra ($300) to have a personalized sermon specifically about their loved one. The event is then live-streamed and there is an opportunity to have a virtual guestbook to share memories and photos. For additional costs, the family can have more customization such as music, zoom, a remembrance video, ext.
As a former chaplain at Seattle Children’s Hospital reverend Pearson knows first hand how important a service is for the grieving. So, while at first he wasn’t completely comfortable going digital, he realized how crucial it is to give closure via a service to these families, so he went forward. Now he doesn’t just think the digital platform is a good temporary pandemic solution, but a good solution for the long term.
