RNS: Tight economy puts the squeeze on death rites

When Leonard Horowitz died at Putnam Hospital recently (April 20), the 92-year-old developmentally disabled man left behind no family, no friends, no savings and no final requests.

Nevertheless, Horowitz was buried with full Jewish rites at Staten Island’s Mount Richmond Cemetery, where Rabbi Shmuel Plafker recited blessings as two workers lowered Horowitz’s plain pine casket into the muddy ground.

The brief ceremony, which concluded within 20 minutes and with Plafker the only mourner present, was the second of the morning for the Hebrew Free Burial Association, a nonprofit organization founded in 1888 to provide funerals for underprivileged Jews.

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Posted in * Christian Life / Church Life, * Economics, Politics, Death / Burial / Funerals, Economy, Parish Ministry, The Credit Freeze Crisis of Fall 2008/The Recession of 2007--

3 comments on “RNS: Tight economy puts the squeeze on death rites

  1. libraryjim says:

    That sounds like a wonderful group! Do we have anything like that in the Anglican world?

  2. Adam 12 says:

    How wonderful and God affirming!

  3. IchabodKunkleberry says:

    Am not sure of the religious affiliation of this group, but they
    provide burials for abandoned children in the L.A. area (?).
    The Garden of Innocence website is here …

    http://www.gardenofinnocence.com/