It was created to provide area families with options ranging from cremation only to Celebration of Life Services as elaborate as each family prefers. Every family is unique and we are honored to work together to celebrate your loved one in a way that pays tribute to their life. South Central Cremation was also established to help other area funeral homes who may not have a crematory on site, but still offer cremation services for their community. We have wonderful relationships with our neighboring colleagues and enjoy helping them provide their families with the best service.

Part of making funeral arrangements on behalf of a loved one involves choosing between burial of the body, or cremation. Certainly this is a big decision, based on any number of factors: religious or spiritual beliefs, finances, or ecological awareness are just some of the reasons we've heard for choosing cremation. Before you can make the choice, you need to know exactly what it is you're considering. You can learn the basics below, however, if the content here raises additional questions for you, please give us a call. One of our cremation specialists will address any of your inquiries or concerns.

The Cremation Association of North America describes cremation as, "The mechanical and/or thermal or other dissolution process that reduces human remains to bone fragments". On our page, The Cremation Process, we offer a deeper look at the most common cremation process which uses extreme heat.

As we said earlier, people choose cremation over burial of casketed remains for any combination of reasons. Sometimes it's the simple fear of burial itself, which may stem directly from the Victorian phobia of being buried alive.

Everyone has their own personal reasons for choosing cremation over traditional casketed burial.

Cremation costs are only one reason.

Given the religious, ethnic, and regional diversity among us, there are many other reasons for the dramatic rise in the number of cremations performed each year. According to Tyler Mathisen of NBC, one of those reasons "is the softening of the Catholic church's views of the practice. For centuries—until 1963, in fact—the church outlawed it. The church's laws still express a preference for burial. But the outright ban is a thing of the past."

He goes on to tell readers that the decline in nuclear families is another reason. "As more Americans live far from hometowns and parents, and as family burial plots have waned in popularity and accessibility, millions have turned to cremation as a practical and cost-effective way to care for a loved one's remains."

Cremation also allows a family the flexibility they may need in planning and preparing for a memorial service, celebration-of-life, or a scattering ceremony. While the cremation process can occur almost immediately (once all the proper paperwork is complete), the decisions required in planning a meaningful memorial for a loved one can be made in a relaxed, rational way.

You can also be sure that concern for the environment ranks high among many who choose cremation. Casketed and embalmed remains take up cemetery space and can pollute the ground water but many still question the amount of atmospheric pollution created by the cremation process.

The latest innovation in cremation is a process of alkaline hydrolysis, sometimes called resomation. The process was developed in the United States in the late 1990s. The Cremation Association of North America describes the process as "a water-based dissolution process for human remains that uses alkaline chemicals, heat, and sometimes agitation and-or pressure, to accelerate natural decomposition".

Compared with traditional cremation, this process uses less energy and releases no carbon and no matter into the atmosphere. Not all regions have made the legislative changes required for funeral homes to offer this service to families and the equipment costs are more than a conventional retort. Both factors currently reduce the availability of resomation cremation services.