The death of a member of the family is always a traumatic experience and, when you are overseas, it is all the more difficult as you are often without the immediate support of other members of your family, though usually friends rally round. Here you will not have the support of a professional funeral director, that many of us are used to, who take responsibility for the necessary arrangements and there is a considerable amount of paperwork needed to be completed before a body can be released for repatriation or burial or cremation in Bahrain.

Although we cannot make the arrangements, we can guide you as to what you need and who you need to see. The Cathedral Administrator will gently guide you through the required procedures.
The Dean and the Assistant Chaplain are also ready to give you the time and attention that you need in order to organize a fitting funeral service or, at a later date, a Memorial service. Very often this is appropriate when someone’s funeral has taken place in their home country but their most recent home and working life has been in Bahrain. It gives significance to that time in Bahrain and gives friends and colleagues here the opportunity to express their condolences, grief and thanks.

A funeral service in St Christopher’s may be very short and quiet with only a few members of the family and friends present, or an occasion of great solemnity with music, hymns and a packed church. Whatever the pattern of service, the words and actions all speak of a loving God and the preciousness to him of every human being.

There is a Christian cemetery in Bahrain, but there is no longer a crematorium in Bahrain, so families need to know that cremation will be done in the manner of a Hindu cremation. We therefore discourage families from being present, believing that it will cause most people too much distress.