Funeral Home and Cremation in Albany, OR

AAsum-Dufour Funeral Home has been serving the families of our community since 1962. When your family has lost a loved one, call on us for funeral home and cremation care in Albany, OR. Our facility is at 805 Ellsworth St SW, Albany, OR 97321. Call today for support at (541) 926-5541. 

The passing of a loved one affects everyone in various ways. It creates extreme stress, disruption of daily life and the exposure of our most deeply-held emotions. This is the time when the helpful and professional staff at AAsum-Dufour takes over. Our purpose is to guide, direct, and relieve you of the many details of this difficult and sometimes confusing process.

Disposition Choices

Choosing how you wish to care for the physical remains of the person who has died will influence how commemorative services will be held. The options are not wholly unfamiliar to most, but there may be new information to help you better understand them. Here’s what you should know about disposition options:

• Casket Burial – Burial in a beautifully crafted casket is a time-honored method of laying a loved one to rest. The casket can be placed in a vault low in the earth or entombed in an above-ground mausoleum. The cost of this type of care can be expensive, depending on the quality of the casket, ground plot, and chosen grave markers.
• Green Burial – For those who want to take part in Mother earth’s intended care of physical remains at life’s end. Green burial avoids embalming chemicals and artificial casket materials. Instead, this environmentally friendly burial type favors using burial products that will biodegrade along with the body in due course, returning borrowed elements to the soil for recycled use in new expressions of life.  
• Fire Cremation – If desired, the decomposition process can be accelerated. The body is placed in a cremation oven and exposed to high heat and flame. In a few short hours, the body is reduced to ash and pieces of bone. These remains are then processed down to coarse sand and given to the family to lay their loved ones to rest. Burial, inurnment, or scattering are common. 
• Water Cremation – The body can also be processed using water and low heat, along with an alkalizing agent. In short order, the decomposition cycle is complete, and soft white bone fragments are leftover. These remains are powered into fine sand and given to the family to do with as they deem best. This method of disposition is less common than standard cremation by flame but is much more environmentally gentle in terms of emissions into the atmosphere. 

A conversation with a funeral and cremation care provider in Albany, OR will give you additional insights about these dispositional choices.

Commemoration Choices

Once you’ve decided how you’d like to care for the body of the person who has died, you will be better able to plan commemorative services. It should be mentioned that some families choose not to hold any funeral or memorial tribute for the fallen, favoring to keep things simple and uncomplicated.

However, mental health professionals dealing with grief and loss in death have identified that funeral and memorial services are powerfully therapeutic. They assist the healing process by providing a way for families and individuals to share their grief with their community, rather than quietly suffering alone. If you choose to hold services, here are the most common ways:

• Traditional Funeral – A visitation or viewing, funeral service, and graveside farewell are held for the deceased. Each of these parts of service provides differing benefits to surviving family and friends who attend. Remembering and honoring a fallen loved one gives rich meaning to the closure of their life, marking the good they brought to the world.
• Memorial Service – Much like a funeral in form and purpose, but without the mortal remains of the deceased present at the service. This difference means that memorials can be held months and years after death takes place.  
• Life Celebration – Surviving families might wish to avoid the emotional heaviness that surrounds traditional funeral and memorial care. Instead, they may hold a party in honor of the person who has died, celebrating their life and love. 

Funeral and Cremation FAQs

Why have a Funeral?

Funerals fill an important role for those mourning the loss of a loved one. By providing surviving family and friends with an atmosphere of care and support in which to share thoughts and feelings about death, funerals are the first step in the healing process. It is the traditional way to recognize the finality of death. Funerals are recognized rituals for the living to show their respect for the dead and to help survivors begin the grieving process.

What is the purpose of embalming?

Embalming sanitizes and preserves the body. Embalming makes it possible to lengthen the time between death and the final disposition, allowing family members time to arrange and participate in the type of service most comforting to them.

Can we scatter the cremated remains?

If you wish to have your ashes scattered somewhere, it is important to discuss your wishes to be scattered ahead of time with the person or persons who will actually have to do the cremation ashes scattering ceremony, as they might want to let your funeral professional assist in the scattering ceremony. Funeral directors can also be very helpful in creating a meaningful and personal ash scattering ceremony that they will customize to fit your family’s specific desires. Read more FAQ here.