Commentary: How the process of grieving for a loved one could start with a livestream.
Some churches and other religious institutions are offering live streaming as a service for weddings and funerals. CNET’s Lexy Savvides shows us what it takes to live broadcast the services.
I had about an hour to make the decision.
I was packing my bags for a three-week trip to Asia when the call came. My grandmother — Mom’s mom and our family’s shining light — had undergone emergency surgery. Doctors addressed one problem only to discover more. My grandma’s frail body was riddled with so many tumors that even if she survived the recovery period, the end was unignorable.
She would have months at best; days, at worst. For a woman as strong, lucid and vibrant as our matriarch, we’d counted on years.
Amid this crushing realization came another reality: If I boarded that plane, I could miss my grandma’s funeral entirely — there wouldn’t be enough time to turn around. My family urged me to take the trip anyway, for myself and for Grandma. (« How wonderful, » she said the last time I had called her. « Learn all the languages! « ) But even the thought of traveling thousands of miles in the wrong direction made me feel hollow and disconnected, when every cell in my body yearned to be close to her.
The author and her grandma, November 2015.
« We’ll Skype you into the funeral, » my mom tried again as I lay crumpled on the other end of the line, ugly-crying into my hands. She was serious. If Grandma didn’t make it, Skyping the service meant I wouldn’t grieve in some anonymous hotel room alone. I managed a snort.
In fact, my mom’s instinct about a video broadcast was spot on. In the past five or so years, numerous funeral homes and religious institutions have begun to routinely stream memorials to help remote mourners say their final goodbyes. Earlier this year, for example, an Atlanta-area megachurch streamed the funeral of its pastor so that members of his congregation could participate from afar.
Some funeral organizers even offer social media etiquette tips for family and friends who attend in person. And the genre of funeral selfies has cropped up, especially among the millennial crowd. Digital mourning , it seems, is going mainstream.
« You tend to associate video calls with a joyful moment, but you tend to have some emotional times on Skype, » said James Blamey, Skype’s director of communications. The company doesn’t track the content of users’ calls, but Blamey says video offers a stronger emotional connection than voice alone, and visual cues inform and comfort callers without the need to speak.
