At Catholic cemetery, the plot thickens

By Laureen McMahon

Big changes are coming to the Gardens of Gethsemani Cemetery and Mausoleum in south Surrey, says new director Robert Shumka.

Big changes are coming to the Gardens of Gethsemani Cemetery and Mausoleum in south Surrey, says new director Robert Shumka.
A cemetery master plan has been commissioned to update the use of the 58 acres of cemetery land to offer a fuller range of funeral services, including meeting the community's growing demand for cremation, Shumka explained.

Professional architects have been commissioned to design the site redevelopment to include columbaria for the deposit of cremated remains. Several cemetery buildings will undergo a facelift, and more acreage will be opened up, while the cemetery continues to offer a full range of services, including traditional in-ground burial and interment in one of two above-ground mausoleums.

All services will be carried out in the same spirit of dignity and reverence for the deceased and care for their families for which the cemetery has been known since it was founded by the late Archbishop James Carney in 1965, said Shumka.

The Gardens of Gethsemani, owned by the Catholic community of the Vancouver Archdiocese, is the Lower Mainland's only regional Catholic cemetery and mausoleum. The only public Catholic mausoleum facilities in the province are located in the Gardens.

"This is the Catholic cemetery; it is for our community," Shumka noted.

Catholics in the Vancouver Archdiocese can be comforted by knowing their loved ones are interred on sacred ground, thanks to the foresight of Archbishop Carney, said Shumka, who acknowledged the many years of dedicated service of the first cemetery director and chaplain, the late Monsignor Nunzio Defoe.

When the cemetery opened, south Surrey was sparsely populated. Today, while new housing and commercial developments have sprung up in every direction, the site remains a peaceful, tranquil oasis.

In fact, said Shumka, more roads have made the site even more accessible from Vancouver, Richmond, Delta, White Rock, and Langley, as well as Surrey and other parts of the Lower Mainland.

Catholic cemeteries are an integral part of the Church's beliefs and rites, and Catholics will normally be buried in their Catholic cemetery.

A Catholic cemetery is a place of prayer for and devotion to the souls of the faithful departed, and is devoted to the doctrines and liturgy of Catholic belief. It maintains in death the community of faith that was shared in life, Shumka noted.

Shumka, who was born in B.C., retired to White Rock eight years ago.

The UBC business graduate, whose career was based on helping ailing businesses become profitable, had lived in Calgary and Toronto. He and his wife had already retired to sunny south Surrey when he noticed an advertisement for a new cemetery director in the parish bulletin. The idea of putting his unique set of marketing skills into helping the cemetery achieve new goals was enticing enough to bring him out of early retirement, and last January he was hired by Archbishop J. Michael Miller, CSB, as director of the cemetery.

"Fortunately there were no financial problems here at the Gardens; quite the opposite," Shumka told The B.C. Catholic. "The cemetery is on very solid financial ground, thanks to Monsignor Defoe, and the 11 staff are terrific. What we really needed was good long-range planning. Although we have 58 acres here, so far just 25 have been used. We need to change that in a way which will much better serve the Catholic community.

"There are many wonderful things about the Gardens of Gethsemani, including our tremendous location. We have two mausoleums containing the remains of the last few archbishops and many deceased priests, but we need to grow, and the master plan will help us do just that, especially with an expansion into columbariums."

New guidelines for funeral and burials in the Catholic Church and other informational packages and brochures on cemetery services are in the process of being updated, said Shumka, to help families become more informed about their choices. Many people, he said, are confused about Catholic funeral policy.

"Full burial is still preferred, but cremation is certainly permitted today," he explained. "In fact, we are at roughly 50 per cent cremation. However, this archdiocese still requires that, for the funeral Mass, the body must be present, with cremation following the Mass. The cemetery is for Catholics and their families, so non-Catholic spouses of Catholics may be buried here.

"I consider that my role and that of all our staff is to inform the Catholic community about what we offer. Our new web site, which is expected to be up and running in early April, will include a full explanation of issues to do with Catholic funerals and an informative question-and-answer section."

More Catholics, he added, need to know about the importance of pre-planning their funeral arrangements, whether their choice is burial, crypt entombment, or niche inurnment.

"Family and individual counselling is available here or in your home in advance of need, and it is by far the best way to take care of your family's needs."

"This is just the start," Shumka said with a smile.

On the sunny Sunday afternoon of March 29, the Gardens of Gethsemani was full of cemetery visitors carrying bouquets of flowers to place on gravesites.

Father Stanley Galvon, pastor of Star of the Sea Parish, offered the Mass in the Gardens' Evangelist Chapel for everyone buried in the cemetery in March. After Mass, the Monsignor Connolly Assembly of the Knights of Columbus led a procession from the chapel to Rachel's Garden for a Rosary for the unborn.

Each year on March 25, the feast of the Annunciation, the Knights observe a Day of the Unborn to stand up and speak out against the evils of abortion, said Knights council member Stan Pidsady, who said it was the second or third time the Rosary for the unborn had been offered at the cemetery.

"It's what we stand for, so it is wonderful to have our Catholic cemetery to come to, to remember these children who have died," said Pidsady. "We are very fortunate here in the archdiocese to have these beautiful Gardens."