Farewell Matters

The Farewell Centre aspires to provide an environment of harmony and quiet and care for the body as the inner being takes its leave during the hours and days after death. The Aurovilians involved have been learning how to respond to death more consciously, to work together, trust one another and maintain as much as possible an attitude of openness and receptivity, together with spontaneity and a grounded practicality and earthiness.

The phone rings. An Aurovilian has passed away. The doctor has issued the death certificate. At this point the family may choose to contact the Farewell team for help. If they do so, a member of the team will come to assess the requirements and the condition of the body.

The first step is to establish whether the body will stay home or go to the Farewell Centre. If the family wishes to take care of the body at home, the Farewell team will provide information as to the practical needs; if the Centre is chosen, an sms is sent out to approximately ten people who will step in at various stages of the process.

In case the body is taken to the Farewell Centre, a team, currently of four, takes care of the washing and dressing. Each body is approached with the sense that a presence is still there, as is often the case. The team has learned its task through experience.

To give the different parts of the being sufficient time to leave the body, and to provide a space for each of the relatives, friends and well-wishers to have a concentrated moment of farewell, the body is kept, often for several days, in a cool box at the Farewell viewing room.

During this period a vigil is arranged during visiting hours and longer, if that is possible. Persons staying by the body hold an atmosphere of calm in the viewing room as well as attend to practical issues such as making sure that not too many candles or incenses are lit (they spoil the air-conditioning), that loose flowers are not placed anywhere in or near the building on the floor (they attract ants), or that the generator does not fail in the middle of the night. Vigils are organised by two members of the Farewell team: family and friends often take turns, yet there are rarely enough volunteers.

The funeral is generally held at the Auroville Burial and Cremation Grounds at Adventure. The most recent development at Farewell has been to organise teams of Aurovilians to take up this aspect of the work. For regardless of whether the body is to be cremated or buried, several teams are needed:

– A team to clean the Grounds. There are neither funds nor the people to maintain the Grounds all year long, hence the space is cleaned only at the occasion of a funeral. This team is as yet rarely made up of Aurovilians.

– A team for flower decoration arrangements. One team member organises this, messaging a list of volunteers. Here, friends and family often participate.

– In the case of burial, a team is needed for the digging and filling. This is arduous physical work and although several individuals have signed up and recent burials have seen Aurovilians help with filling-in the grave, the team is not yet large enough. As of today, burials still depend on paid labour. Other Aurovilians are contributing in various ways, such as the making of the bier, the stitching of the cloth being used, etc.

– In the case of cremation, a team of Aurovilians will take charge. In December 2016, twelve Aurovilians received cremation training using a dummy. Since then, the team has conducted three cremations, further developing their understanding of the process. An additional team collects and brings all necessary material to the site: wood, straw, cow patties, camphor, ghee, etc. Until recently, these tasks were fulfilled by a professional team from the Pondicherry Cremation Grounds, following a method used by the Sri Aurobindo Ashram (which consumes much less wood than the traditional pyre).

– As a last step of the process, two days after the cremation, the ashes must be collected and handed to the family.

Challenges and steps forward

Considerable progress has been made, as more and more of us learn to accompany each other through this part of the journey. However being in Auroville one must always ask, what more can we do and how?

Two aspects complement one another: the requirements of the Farewell Centre and the attitude of the Aurovilians to death and what happens to our body once it is pronounced ‘dead’.

The Farewell Centre needs support both financially and in terms of physical participation. Fundraising has not been easy, as not many people are inspired by this cause. Auroville has not allocated a budget to the Farewell Centre to cover its running costs nor does it receive any maintenance for the people working there. The only expenditures currently covered are the costs incurred from the time of a death to the completion of a funeral, either by Auroville or by the family and from occasional donations.

Aurovilians work there in addition to their main activity, and those who volunteer have to be willing and ready whenever the need arises to make themselves available. Ideally, with additional participation, the maintenance and care of the Burial and Cremation Grounds at Adventure would be part of year-long work. With appropriate attention, it can easily become a place of beauty. As of now, there is no caretaker at the Grounds and the only regular visitors are goats and cows.

As the population grows and ages, the matter of choice between burial and cremation may be of more consequence.

A proper planning of the Burial Grounds will become necessary, and the cremation place is in need of improvements.

Death is a part of our journey which we often remain reluctant to look at or speak of, thereby leaving it in the care of cultural or religious traditions and habitual responses in the face of this abrupt separation. But Auroville is an adventure in consciousness. Therefore we must confront and address all our questions regarding death in this light, both as individuals and as a community, and we must try and discover together the ways of the future in material and practical terms as well as in terms of our inner search.

Recently, as students of Auroville asked questions about the process of death, a one month workshop was held at one of the schools, looking at what death is, how it is dealt with in different parts of the world, and in Auroville.

According to The Mother, there are no two identical cases, and it may be up to each Aurovilian to help discover a new living awareness which progressively finds its own physical expression.

In this sense Farewell represents and provides a direct training, a way of learning to anchor ourselves at once spiritually and in this present physical condition.