Memorial Garden
For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made in hands, eternal in the heavens. 2 Corinthians 5:1
The Memorial Garden at Paoli Presbyterian Church is an attractively landscaped area set aside for prayer and meditation. A peaceful, park-like setting provides dignified internment space for cremated remains either in the garden wall or in the ground. The beautiful cross, garden paths, benches, and flowering trees and shrubs encourage quiet reflection and thanksgiving for the promise of eternal life.
Vermont granite stones mark the wall or ground internment spaces, providing a focus for family members and friends as they remember their loved ones. Engraved plaques provide a means for memorializing loved ones interred elsewhere.
The Memorial Garden is a place of serenity and comfort. It is place where people can enjoy the beauty of God’s creation and celebrate the miracle of life in all its glory, including death and resurrection.
The beauty and serenity of our garden are available for all to enjoy, and internment is open to church members, families, and friends. Internment costs are nominal. A single fee provides a choice in internment space, the engraved granite marker, opening and closing of the internment space, and perpetual care.
Preregistration of internment space is encouraged in order to secure the location desired within the Garden. Additional information or an application (which includes the regulation governing the use of the Garden) can be obtained by calling the church office.
Our Memorial Garden is a return to tradition of our ancestors. They believed that it was important for a congregation to inter its members and their families close by the church where they had faithfully served and worshiped.
Statement of Cremation
At the center of the biblical proclamation is the good news of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and that through Christ, death is overcome once and for all. One of the decisions Christians hopefully discuss and decide before death concerns burial, cremation or donation of the body for medical purposes.
Our Church is fortunate to have a Memorial Garden where members can choose to have their remains placed if cremated. Because we believe in the resurrection of a new body, what a person chooses to do with the earthly body remains a matter of conscience, preference and comfort level.
As we say in the service of committal. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” Whether over many years as in casket burial or quickly through the process of cremation, we believe God created us from the earth and to the earth we return. Resurrection marks the time when we receive new bodies and are fully brought into the presence of our great and gracious God.