Lots of volunteer heroes in our profession right now

This Funeral Director Daily article will  not do enough justice to the funeral director/mortician profession but it is an attempt to show how those in our profession are going well out of their way to help other funeral directors in need and to help humanity as a whole.

In New York City there are only five cremation retorts.  The backlog to get a specific deceased body cremated can be a month long.  There are also burials that need to be done out of state in neighboring states like Connecticut, Vermont, and Pennsylvania.

Most funeral homes and their funeral directors in New York City and the immediate surroundings are so busy making removals, dealing with families, and preparing bodies for earth burial or cremation that they simply don’t have the time to transport bodies to their cemeteries or out of town crematories.  In addition, they just don’t have the rolling stock to physically handle all of the transportation needs.

Into that chaos stepped 58-year old licensed funeral director Dave Penepent.  Mr. Penepent is an associate professor of Funeral Service Administration at the State University of New York at Canton. . .SUNY-Canton.  With four of his students he created an organization called “Hands with a Heart” to transport deceased to cemeteries and crematories.

Hands with a Heart is a free service created by Penepent and, according to this article, he says, “I am not getting paid, my reward is the solitude of knowing that families can begin the grieving process because they know their loved ones have been laid to rest.”

Mike Lanotte, the Executive Secretary of the New York State Funeral Directors Association, said the association has been covering the expenses of volunteers like Penepent.  Lanotte is quoted in the article, “We have had an amazing outpouring of support and have received donations from other funeral directors and other funeral associations as well”.

Again, according to the article, Penepent transported 70 bodies over Easter week, last week he says he transported 150 bodies, and this week he will transport over 250 bodies to crematories or their final resting place.

Here is another article entitled, “The mortuary science professor who came “Out of Nowhere” to help NYC”Editor’s note — This article is from the New York Times but has been made available.  You do, however, have to register an email to read it.  It is an excellent article on Professor Penepent, his crew, and their work.

Funeral Director Daily take:  I’ve always been impressed by the camaraderie and care of the funeral service profession.  With my funeral business being located in the northern tier of the United States, we always had a couple of deaths during the winter season among our “snowbirds” living in Arizona and/or Florida.  Almost always was I impressed by the thoughtfulness and care trade call establishments showed to us and the families we served when we called on them.

I’ve said before in Funeral Director Daily that our profession is not so much about death care as it is about compassion.  The “compassion” exhibited to volunteer, especially in the wake of a deadly disease, is truly one of the finest forms of humanity that one can exhibit.  Hats off to those in our profession doing so.

More news from death care:

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