OPINION: THE DIFFICULTIES experienced by journalist Roy Greenslade in finding somewhere in Donegal where his late mother might be buried raises some important questions of principlem writes Dudley Levistone Cooney
A report in Friday's Irish Times quotes him as saying that "according to the church people I approached - and underlined by the undertaker - an atheist cannot be buried (in Donegal) because the churches, Catholic, Church of Ireland and Presbyterian, own the graveyards".
That the Catholics and Presbyterians have the legal right to refuse burial in cases where the deceased does not profess their faith is something I could not question. But under Act 31 and 32 Vic, cap 103, I am aware that Church of Ireland clergy do not have the same right.
In the 19th century, a number of the Established Church clergy (ie Church of Ireland clergy) regularly insisted on performing the burial rites for any person, of whatever religious persuasion, who had burial rights in the parish church graveyards, and their refusal to allow ministers of other denominations to officiate within the walls of the graveyards created some unpleasant incidents, as well as great resentment.
The matter was legally resolved by the passing of "An Act to amend the Law which regulates the burial of persons in Ireland not belonging to the Established Church", of which I have quoted the reference above, and which was passed in 1868. It established the right of persons not belonging to the United Church of England and Ireland to be buried in accordance with their own beliefs.
The Act goes on to refer to priests or ministers who might conduct such burials. In the mores of those days it probably did not occur to the legal draftsmen that anyone might want to be buried without the presence of a minister of religion, but in these more secular times the courts might be expected to regard humanism as a non-theistic religion.
It would be valuable to have a legal ruling as to whether or not I am right in this. I suspect that the situation is likely to arise more frequently in years to come.
Following the disestablishment of the Church of Ireland, a case was submitted in 1878 to the solicitor-general of that day raising two questions.
The Act referred to people being buried "as of right"; what did these words mean? The principle in his opinion relevant to this case was that the right of burial belonged prima facie "to every resident in the parish, who died therein".
The second question concerned the effect of the Act that disestablished the Irish church. The solicitor-general commented: "I am of opinion that the rights of burials as they existed at the time of the passing of the Act 31 and 32 Vic, cap 103, have not been affected by the Irish Church Act."
There are in the Act certain regulations about times to be avoided, and about due notice to rectors.
The former rector who advised Greenslade that the burial of his mother in a local Church of Ireland graveyard was "out of the question" may have been guilty of a misdemeanour under the 1868 Act.
In the last analysis, I cannot believe that the burial of the late Mrs Greenslade would have desecrated a Christian burial ground.
There have been cases where people have lived without any reference to any church, but when they have died their funerals have been conducted in a church, because that is the way these things have been done.
I would honour the honesty of her family, who wished to have her buried as she had lived without reference to a divine being.
Christian burial grounds, I would submit, are governed not by the beliefs of the deceased, but by the faith of the church. Part of that faith is the conviction that every human being is made in the image of the creator, and should be accorded the dignity which that implies.
Mrs Greenslade may have rejected that view of herself, but the churches have not. Far too often in the past we have made exclusions on the basis of opinion, and narrowed our definitions of Christianity.
• Dudley Levistone Cooney is a retired Methodist minister. He was Methodist co-chairman of the Joint Theological Working Party 1989-2003 which prepared the Church of Ireland Methodist Covenant