to think taking photos of someone in a coffin is the height of disrespect?

I don’t personally like it but my parents are catholics and they had many a family funeral with the open casket in the living room when they were growing up. I think in Britain we have a different relationship with death, in a lot of cultures they have more of a celebration and maybe to these people taking photos is part of that.

Absolutely not and I am so sorry for your loss.

To me it’s weird. I could maybe understand if it was a loved one, but someone they don’t know is strange to me. What are they going to do with the photo? Each to their own though. I wouldn’t like anyone taking photos of me when I’m dead.

I actually think the height of disrespect for a dead body is to shove it in a furnace and burn it.

For Catholics and the Orthodox Churches (i.e. the true church and not some pale imitation), cremation is a sin as it is the desecration of the body.

My best friend died sadly a couple of years ago and she had an open casket and I’ll be honest - I didn’t go up to view her because I had this deranged thought she sit up and say ‘I win’ or pull a face at me.
Not very respectful I know but for that reason alone I didn’t and I actually know that’s why she did an open casket because she’d threatened me with it !!

I'm a Catholic and I find it a bit creepy , I shall be having a closed coffin at my funeral so nobody can be touching me or taking pictures.

I also have my stillborn on prominent display in my bedroom......is that bad taste?

My partners mum (now full on dementia) is 100% Catholic italian who came over during the war and she has coffin photos of every single family member that has passed away - we found them all on her phones when going through her things, it's a cultural thing. Leave them alone.

In the 70s when I first visited families in rural France, it was very common to have framed photographs of loved ones in open caskets on prominent display in the house.

It seems distasteful to me, but when my husband died a colleague, who’d lost his wife similarly young a few years earlier, asked if I was having a funeral photographer. He’d had the service photographed by a professional, in the way one might have a wedding photographed. No open coffin though I don’t think. Even so, most odd to me but of course each to their own and I didn’t say want I actually thought!

https://funeralmemories.co.uk/funeral-photography/

It is a cultural thing, and I am sure people would be stopped if it was not allowed.

Remember, back in Victorian times, taking photos of the dead was the norm.

I'm not catholic, but this is a part of my culture too. You should see our family photo albums. Jay's 1st tooth! Aw, Bea's wedding! And who could forget, Nan's funeral, remember the pie that Kip made?!

I have a photo of DH, it's for me only and not posted anywhere. His last days were painful and he looked like he was really hurting, in his coffin he looked at peace and dressed how he'd have wanted to be remembered. I took it just after I'd helped to dress him for his funeral.

I've just seen the body in full technicolour, moving picture glory on the teatime news. I don't think it is particularly disrespectful, it's just something that will happen when you're the pope.

Watch the news, even worse is those attempting to take a selfie with the dead Pope in the background. Just wtf do they think they’re doing??

A photo is fine, a selfie less so.

At least they're not taking bits as relics.

I have a photo of my dad. No-one has ever seen it. It’s for me, to remind me how peaceful he looked after a long drawn out death. I wouldn’t
be taking photos of the pope or anyones funeral who might have had an open coffin (rare in UK).

As the church were the first to release a photo, I guess they don't think so. It does seem odd to me.

Considering in earlier Catholicism people used to jostle literally to take a piece of the corpse, I think jostling for a great photo is a step up!

Casket viewings and funerals are often much more visual - and rowdier - in other cultures, quiet mourning and stiff upper lips is a particular feature of white Protestant Anglo Saxon death culture.

Not really.

Horrid. But then I cannot comprehend why anyone would choose an open coffin.

Cultural differences. It’s a Catholic Thang.

If they post them on social media, is that cultural too?