The way we send each other off to the afterlife can vary depending on the culture. But generally, there are expectations for how guests should conduct themselves. It's a very emotionally charged occasion, and behavior matters.
However, not everyone gets it. Recently, we came across a couple of Reddit threads where people shared all the inappropriate things they've witnessed at funerals. From taking pictures with silly filters to playing obnoxious music, here are some of the most memorable stories. One person's solemn tribute is another person's "me time," it seems.
#1
Only somewhat inappropriate, but certainly the funniest thing...
It was a funeral for an uncle I was very distantly related to, and (this is happening in Greece, in the summer), the church is very full and incredibly hot, you can smell the sweat, there's incense, the air isn't circulating, and the priest is just going on and on - I don't think I can describe how grim the situation was. Not totally unexpectedly therefore, just as the priest is getting to something particularly emotional, a man, an old colleague standing near the back, faints - he's completely out. Now, this guy was very tall and rather broad, so not only was it a miracle that he didn't take out the two tiny old ladies right in front of him, he was also really difficult to carry outside to get some air!
Somebody has the brilliant idea that the pallbearers (those people who carry the casket) should carry him, since they've practiced it and are reasonably strong. So everybody squeezes a bit tighter (nobody wants to leave the church, things just got interesting) to let them through. They pick him up, three on one side and three on the other, i.e. more or less as they would the casket, and start carrying him towards the door. Suddenly, this guy wakes up, turns his head several times, grasps what's going on and who's carrying him faster than anybody can respond, and immediately starts yelling "I'M ALIVE! I'M ALIVE! I'M ALIVEEEEEE!" At which point, one of the pallbearers laughs so hard that he drops what was thankfully a leg, and the others struggle to put him down in what is now a church absolutely exploding with laughter. The whole situation went on for a good fifteen minutes in which this guy walked outside and the priest tried to resume the service, but there absolutely continued to be giggles throughout - I, being a teenager at the time, also couldn't possibly hold it back every time I thought of this guy yelling he's alive!
Nobody was even particularly upset because the uncle we were burying was always laughing and joking around, so it somehow felt appropriate that we had a great laugh at his funeral.
© Photo: ioannas
#2
My grandmother's funeral was on her birthday. I purchased "happy birthday" balloons because it was what she would have wanted. I was immediately reprimanded by my mother when I arrived as she forgot it was her birthday. But everyone that knew the family knew that she would have loved it, even my grandfather laughed when I walked in with them.
© Photo: Thecrdbrdsamurai
#3
An estranged uncle driving past my grandmother's funeral playing Another One Bites the Dust.
© Photo: ally_tgm
#4
At my grandfather's funeral, the stand-in, curmudgeonly pastor kept calling my grandfather by the wrong name.
Pastor: we are here to memorialize the life of John Smith.
Pastor: John Smith lived a good life. I had never personally met John Smith, but
My Spouse Loudly: Well, I've never met John Smith either. His name was Bob White.
Everyone attending burst out laughing.
© Photo: TooManyDogsHere
#5
My father’s funeral.
After the service and the reception after, my mother, brother, and sister headed back to our family home. A bunch of my father’s siblings and their family were also staying at the house with us. We got home a few minutes before everyone else.
I was sitting at a table in the living room when I could see their cars come down the driveway. They all got out and were hugging and seemingly congratulating each other. The reception after the service was beautifully put together, and was actually a fun time. A fitting send off for my father. So I assumed they were still just having fun from that. Until they came inside.
They all came in together very quickly, and quietly. They came up to me and my older brother sitting at the table, and kind of crowded around like a bunch of kids, about to see if they could have a cookie before dinner. My aunt Barbara smugly stood at the front and asked, “so when are we going to be doing the reading of the will to see what was left to us all?”
My brother and I just looked at each other for a few moments before we turned to them to say, “are you kidding? Reading of the will? Like a soap opera? There is no reading of the will. Everything that belonged to my father now just belongs to my mother!”
The look of defeat, but not shame, was disgustingly transparent. They were supposed to stay another few nights. They packed up and left that afternoon.
© Photo: Imadethisuponthespot
#6
We had a snowball fight outside the parlor of my pop pops funeral...
Pop pop would have approved.
The non-family mourners seemed horrified.
© Photo: anon
#7
We went out to dinner after my dad’s funeral. I had snagged one of his hoodies from his closet, and I was wearing it. My brother noticed and kinda sarcastically said, “Hey. Nice jacket.”
I said, “Thanks. I got it off a dead guy.”.
#8
My grandpa's phone going off in the middle of the eulogy and his ringtone was "Staying Alive" by the BeeGees.
#9
The lady who convinced my mother to ditch chemo and use essential oils, handed put biz cards at her funeral.
© Photo: Miablossom
#10
My best friend died last year from a random heart failure at 25.
The pastor at the funeral went on for about 10 minutes about how we had all been responsible for him [passing] because we were sinners and that we should join his church to make amends. He didn't know any of us. It was very uncomfortable.
© Photo: jonker5101
#11
My own kids. Boys ages 10 and 8. At their great-grandfathers wake, they got a chair and moved it to the casket and started making his mouth into smiley face. Laughing the whole time. When me and their grandfather (my father in law) saw it, I immediately pulled them away and told them they shouldn't do that, grandpa laughed and said "it's fine, he would have really loved that they did that". We later found out that the great grandfather had asked the funeral home ahead of time to put a sign in his hand that said "thanks for coming" but they refused!
© Photo: Cobra1190
#12
The priest *repeatedly* refered to my grandmother by the wrong name!!! After the 4th or 5th time my Aunt got up and and quietly told him the correct name. My grandmother had attended church weekly for decades. There was no reason for the priest to not know his parishioner. Needless to say we did not pay his fee.
© Photo: 3bigdogs
#13
At an open casket wake, a friend of the deceased attempted to give her a drink of single malt whiskey. She ended up being forcibly removed as she wouldn't stop and spilled a lot of the alcohol in the casket. It was as horrible and inappropriate as it was heartbreaking - for everyone.
© Photo: ohenry0923
#14
Someone trying to "quietly" open a can while they were doing the closing prayer.
© Photo: Midnight_Moon29
#15
At cremation, someone's cellphone ringed playing "girl on fire" took a good 15 seconds to shut off.
© Photo: MilkAzedo
#16
At my grandpa's funeral in 2006 a random drunk woman that no one in our family knew stumbled in and started singing show tunes, then crying til she was escorted out.
© Photo: meowkait
#17
A marriage proposal to the recently widowed. She accepted.
I know this is a thing in some families where if a guy dies, a single, male, relative, of the deceased, will end up marrying the widow. Why this is a thing, I dunno but know it is. So, the divorced brother proposed to his deceased, brother's wife and she said yes. I doubt there was any cheating going on there. The two are still happily married as well.
© Photo: Maxpowr9
#18
At my cousins funeral, one of my relatives literally tried jumping in the casket with him. Really traumatizing experience I might add.
© Photo: PraisePancakes
#19
I'm a funeral director. This happened.
We brought a man into our care who had died of AIDS complications in 1999 or so. His parents were immigrants from Eastern Europe who were very conservative and had not known their son was gay. He had moved to Milwaukee from their little town in the sticks about ten years earlier. Cancer was what his mom and dad were told. His friends in Milwaukee had their own services that the parents didn't attend, and I worked with the parents on a Mass of Christian Burial and interment in his hometown. The decedent's brother and sister met with the priest and asked him not to mention their brother's "lifestyle" during his homily, and explained why. He agreed.
So the Mass starts, and the normal rituals get going, and then it's time for the priest to speak at length. A traditional Catholic homily in a conservative church like that one isn't a normal eulogy. It's purpose is to "bring glory to the Father," and if the deceased is spoken of at all it is about his or her devotion to God and how that was evident from earthly actions. The priest got to a certain point in his pretty much boilerplate remarks, and then took an audible breath and told everyone that he was feeling moved by the Holy Spirit to speak freely. He spoke about decisions that people make that are contrary to God's Plan, and how that inevitably results in corruption, and you can probably guess the rest of it. He never actually mentioned AIDS or sexuality, but it was pretty much right there if you read even a little bit between the lines.
He did not go in procession to the cemetery, rather went in his own car and was waiting for us when we all pulled up. I don't think I had even turned off the engine to the hearse when the brother got out of his car, rushed to the front of the line of cars, and got in the priest's face, who then drove away without performing the burial rites. I was told later that the brother went with, "How dare you?" and the priest countered with, "I follow the Spirit. I had no choice." Honestly surprised the brother didn't lay him out.
There are some things that happen at work that you just wish were happening on your very last day on the job.
#20
At my grandma's funeral. There was a woman that had a really bad relationship with my grandma, but one of my aunts invited her to the funeral.
She started receiving people as if she was a family member and tried to put herself at the center of everything.
© Photo: MarsNirgal
#21
At my great-grandmother's funeral, her son showed up to the funeral wearing khakis and his bright orange Tennessee Vols shirt. Then he started yelling at my mom when she asked him who the pallbearers were going to be, mainly throwing a fit about who was in the will... Mind you we hadn't even left the funeral home yet and were literally needing to know who they would be at that very moment.
Needless to say we don't talk to that side of the family anymore.
#22
Using snapchat filters on the deceased during an open casket funeral. It made my blood boil.
© Photo: anon
#23
I worked at a funeral home several years ago. One of the services happened to take place on the day of the Columbia Shuttle disaster, so there was a lot of chatter about it amongst the attendees. A relative of the deceased woman got up in front of everyone during the service and postulated that the shuttle and its crew had been struck from the sky by this lady's soul as she ascended to Heaven.
#24
My grandma died a few years ago and we decided on a burial. After the interment ceremony, the groundskeeper asked us if we would like to leave before they finished packing the dirt. MY FAMILY SAID NO!
Cut to us horrifically watching my grandmas casket get repeatedly dirt punched by an excavator.
It was more disturbing than inappropriate.
#25
A narcisstic family member arrived late (after everyone else was at the graveside for the burial, and probably lurking behind a tomb to pick the perfect time after the priest had just started talking), wearing an enormous hat and sunglasses and low cut gown like she was attending the Golden Globes red carpet or something, and loudly making an absolute scene of how devasted she was, daaaaaarlings and just generally making it all about her.
© Photo: Zhirrzh
#26
The pastor took the opportunity to say that if we didn't start going to church we were all going to Hell.
#27
I worked at a Cemetery one Summer when I was in High School. This usually involved mowing/weedeating, but they also had me help on the setup/teardown of burial equipment.
The worst I saw was just a screaming argument that appeared to be sibling upset one took advantage of their now deceased Mother.
The most interesting thing was observing how culturally different groups handled the burial.
White families always left right after the preacher was finished. So we would lower the coffin with everyone gone. Black families always stayed until the dirt started going on top. Only had one Asian funeral and it was a cremation.
#28
My partner's stepmum's funeral.
I was standing next to my partner to support him when one of his distant relatives, before even giving condolences or a greeting or anything else, asked "are you two married?"
"No..."
"Oh but you're together?"
"Yes."
"What a shame."
The same woman then approached us at the wake and started going on about how nice it was to see young love blossom after a family breakup and how "exotic" I was (I'm Asian, he's white) because my partner had broken up with the mother of his child. She heavily implied that I was just a rebound and that he would be "back to his normal self soon". When my partner corrected her and told her that we had been together for 5 years, she visibly became uncomfortable and said "Oh. How nice.".
#29
The preacher at my wife's grandfather's funeral. He mentioned in the eulogy at least a solid dozen times that he (the grandfather) was poor. So very, very poor. Never had a dime. But loved his family. But was soooo poor. My wife's brother got so sick of it he actually stood up, in the front row, and just gave everyone a look like 'What'?.
#30
Honestly, we were all pissed that this woman showed up at all. The dead guy *hated* her.
She showed up wearing a Little Mermaid t-shirt and Pikachu hat. While the priest spoke, she stood up and paced in front of him a few time, then say next to the dead guy's grieving fiance and told her "no one is more upset about this than me."
Someone discreetly pulled her away and sat her down three rows back where she loudly sobbed, wailed, sniffed and professed her grief.
When the service ended, she stood up in front of the casket and invited everyone in the room to a party she was hosting that night.
#31
At my father's funeral. A neighbor we don't see very much of approached my mother and asked if she was planning to sell my parent's house now that she was alone. He wanted to move his mother in from out of state. He then asked if she could stop by sometime and identify the owner of the garbage that was blowing into his property. He did all of this while holding up the condolences line.
#32
Picture if you will, two elderly women in a funeral squaring up as people are still crying from the ceremony.
At the lunch after my grandpa’s funeral, his daughter from a previous marriage “Dee” who no one had seen in years showed up. Dee had been writing bad checks all the way to the state prison and had definitely had some unresolved beef with my family when she got out. The last time my mom saw her was when was 11 and Dee left her infant daughter for my mom to babysit and never came back, Fast forward to the funeral, Dee is acting like it’s a family reunion but no one is having it since she’s basically screwed everyone in the room in one way or another. My grandpa’s last girlfriend, a legally blind woman tried to physically fight her until others stepped in.
After the funeral, Dee tried to steal the car willed to grandpa’s blind boo but my family thought ahead and a couple of my uncles waited around the house until Dee came for the car, they came outside and apparently she was scared off. Blind boo got the car in the end and wrecked it immediately.
#33
Maybe isn't as over the top as most of these comments, but I'm one of the Marines that has to go present the flag to the next of kin when a service member dies. It's usually old Vietnam and Korea Vets, but sometimes it's a desert storm or recent war vet and the mother is there receiving the flag instead of a son or daughter. Point is I've probably been to 45 funerals in the past year.
It's striking how often someone's phone goes off during the service. It seems nearly every other or every third service someones ring tone start playing. There's been a few times where someone will get up from their seat and answer the phone to.
#34
My boyfriend's ex-wife being all happy and smiley cause he didn't update his will before he died and she was still getting half.
#35
My step-grandmother died a few months before the Borat movie came out, so everyone was in full-blown Borat mode. Someone's phone went off and their ringtone was "Throw The Jew Down The Well."
EDIT: She, as well as most of the people attending the funeral, were all Jewish.
#36
I've mentioned it before but at the wake for my very young sister, my aunt started talking to me about how she was going to write children's books and gave me a pen with her contact information on it. I'm not sure what she wanted, but I write and edit and I was working on an English degree and we barely ever see her so I took it as self-promotion, not offering ways to reach out. My Mom threw the pen away.
#37
A kid doing a fortnight dance
It was a relative of my mother who died, he was a nice guy who worked hard and helped people outside along comes his nephew and instead of paying his respects or just standing like a normal human he gets right next to the coffin and does a fortnight dance. This made me think genocidal thoughts.
