Matthew wrote:Yes, the most dignified and respectful and loving treatment of our departed loved ones is to bury them without embalming, and definitely no cremation.
Agreed. However, the funeral industry has convinced us that we must have funeral plaques or tomb stones and that our loved ones need a "permanent resting place." Nothing is permanent. An earthquake, tsunami, flood, or avalanche of mud can bury a cemetery.
Notice that the article fails to discuss what happens with the bones. We see pictures from Mt. Athos where vaults are full of skulls. However, each skull has been labelled with the name of the departed. Obviously these skulls did not decompose.
In cremation, after burning the corpse, intact skulls and bones remain. The ground up bones along with powdered concrete from the grinders are mixed with the ashes. So the remains in the fancy urns contain not only ashes, but also bits of bones and powdered concrete. In addition, ashes from previously cremated corpses can contaminate the ashes as the crematory is not cleaned thoroughly after the remains are removed. This information and more was provided to me by the crematory when my brother-in-law was cremated. I will spare you all the details.
Matthew wrote:But as for the idea of using them for making nutrient rich soil to grow our food...YUCK! What a sick idea. :ohvey:
Exactly. Consider the amount of mercury and other contaminants used in dental fillings, which would contaminate the soil. In addition, consider all the dangerous pesticides, Round Up, and herbicides consumed in vegetables, GMO-foods, fluoride containing pharmaceuticals, and over-the-counter drugs that still remain in the body of the deceased. All these would render useless any soil produced from human remains. In addition, composting temperatures of 140 degrees F or less might not sufficient to kill Norovirus and other dangerous viruses.
Residue from sewer treatment plants used to be sold as fertilizer and potting soil, and in many hardware stores, it still is. Read the labels. Some fertilizers and potting soils now contain a disclaimer disclosing the presence of contaminants such as mercury, lead, and other dangerous contaminants known to cause cancer that are found in the processed sewage. Note that most non-GMO foods are still fertilized with this processed sewage as municipalities are desperate to dispose of these dangerous wastes at very inexpensive prices. If you have ever driven through Oxnard, Ventura County, Bakersfield, Fresno, Indio and other farmlands in California, you will be offended with the stench. The farmlands in the greater Phoenix valley of Arizona also also loaded with this stench.