What Makes a Good Funeral?

Ask people about the best funeral they ever attended and the answers have almost nothing to do with money. They talk about a story someone told, a song that was exactly right, the moment the whole room laughed. Ask about the worst and it is the same list in reverse: a stranger mispronouncing the name, a eulogy that could have been about anyone, two hours in a hard pew. Here is what the good ones have in common.

1. The person is present in it

Their music, not "funeral music". Their photographs, including the unflattering one everyone loves. Their words, quoted. A good funeral could not be mistaken for anyone else's. The quickest test, when planning: would they have recognised this as theirs? If the answer is "it is very tasteful", keep going.

2. The right people speak

One or two who knew them well, who can stand up, and who have written it down. A eulogy is not an open mic; the family chooses, asks a week ahead, and gives a length. Five minutes is a good eulogy. Twelve is a long one. Eulogy examples show the shape. The officiant, if there is one, should have talked to the family and should say the name correctly, every time.

3. It is the right length

Forty-five minutes to an hour for a service, a little more with a Mass. People can hold grief and attention for about that long; after it, they are thinking about their legs. Three readings, two songs, one or two eulogies, a few words from the officiant, a closing. Cut before adding.

4. People have something to do

A good funeral gives the mourners jobs: carry, read, light, place, sing, sign the book, walk behind. The family sitting rigid for an hour while a professional does everything is the worst of both worlds. Grandchildren who placed a flower on the casket remember the funeral forty years later as something they did, not something that was done to them.

5. There is food afterwards

The meal, the reception, the sandwiches in the hall, whatever it is: that is where the stories come out and where the family first laughs. Funerals without one end in a parking lot with everyone unsure whether they are allowed to leave. Budget for the food before the flowers.

6. There is something to take home

The printed program is the one object from the day that survives. It has the photograph, the dates, the order of service, the obituary, the poem that was read. It ends up in Bibles, drawers and frames, and it is what the grandchildren find. What goes in it, and the designs here make one from the obituary in a few minutes.

What spoils one

• A eulogy that is a résumé. Nobody came to hear where they worked.
• Religion, or its absence, that the person would not have chosen. Honour what they believed.
• A surprise speaker. The one who was not asked and will not stop.
• No seats for the old, no sound for the back, no tissues anywhere.
• Rushing the family out because the next service is at two. Ask the funeral home about the gap.

None of the six costs much. A funeral in a church hall with the right music, two good eulogies and a table of food is a good funeral. A lavish one where nobody said anything true is not.