Caring for the departed

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This article was published 22/02/2020 (2390 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

For the first time in nine decades, Winnipeg’s Jewish community will go outside its own funeral home to prepare bodies for burial.

The operations of Chesed Shel Emes have temporarily moved to Chapel Lawn Funeral Home, 4000 Portage Ave., while the North Main funeral home is rebuilt.

“We’re so used to doing the rituals in this space,” explains executive director Rena Boroditsky of the challenges of the move.

“Now it’s figuring out how to do it there.”

Established in 1930, Chesed Shel Emes operates out of two connected buildings: an office and preparation area at 1023 Main St. dating to 1905, and a large adjoining chapel constructed in 1947.

In the next few weeks, the older building will be demolished to make way for a two-storey, 4,000-sq.-ft. building on the same site, Total cost of the project is $3.18 million, funded by donations from the Jewish community.

The new building will feature a larger preparation room, state-of-the-art refrigeration units, private meeting space for mourners, offices, more storage space, accessible front and back entrances and an elevator.

Boroditsky says the new the space will be a huge improvement over the much renovated current building, but it won’t be extravagant.

“The whole foundation of the burial society is equality and modesty,” says Boroditsky, director since 1996.

“It’s not in our character to put up a big flashy building.”

She says a Jewish burial also reflects that modesty, with all bodies dressed in identical three-piece unbleached cotton shrouds sewn by local volunteers and then placed in a simple wooden coffin with rope handles.

Funerals are generally held within two days of death, and all bodies are washed by trained volunteers with 24 quarts of water and then dried, dressed and placed in a coffin. Chesed Shel Emes does not embalm bodies and the organization is not a licensed funeral home, but a religious society that performs a ritual service, says Boroditsky.

“Our guiding principles are care for the dead and comfort for the mourners,” she says of Jewish rituals around death.

The non-profit funeral society serves the entire Jewish community, performing ritual services for Jews of any traditions who are buried in the ground.

With 150 funerals a year, Boroditsky says Chesed Shel Emes needed a dedicated space to prepare bodies according to Jewish traditions, and Chapel Lawn could accommodate that, along with space to sit with the dead, since Jewish custom requires a body is never left alone.

“The idea is to be in proximity to the body. That’s what we’re here for, to care for the soul,” she says of the watchers, called shomrim.

“It’s a lovely way to show compassion to the dead because it comforts the living to know their loved ones are being treated with kindness and not left alone.”

Since Chapel Lawn’s new 25,000-sq.-ft building was designed to accommodate multiple events with two chapels, two reception centres, and a secondary preparation room, they had space to accommodate the Jewish funeral home temporarily, explains manager Perry Curtis.

“We’ve worked very closely with the Jewish community over the years and when they asked us it was pretty easy for us to say yes,” he says of the year-long arrangement.

Boroditsky will continue to work out of the Chesed Shel Emes chapel on Main Street, but no funerals will be held there until construction next door is completed in early 2021. The space is now used for storing caskets, shrouds and other supplies needed for body preparation.

Winnipeg’s Muslim community is also in the process of constructing a building for ritual preparation. The $600,000 body washing facility at Grand Mosque, 2445 Waverley St., should be completed by early spring, says volunteer funeral director Abdul Aziz of Manitoba Islamic Association.

brenda@suderman.com

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