The Final Kindness    

Thousands of elderly Jews will pick cremation over burial if they aren’t guided otherwise, yet any frum person they interact with, whether a chaplain, nursing home staffer, or even a neighbor or chesed visitor, can open the door to a relationship that will lead another Jewish neshamah to rest in peace. While starting a conversation about such a seemingly morbid subject feels impossible, those who’ve succeeded will tell you how

Rabbi Shalom Lubin, director of Chabad of Southeast Morris County in New Jersey, rabbi of Congregation Shaya Ahavat Torah in Parsippany, a nursing home chaplain, and a chevra kaddisha member for 22 years, has been there for hundreds of elderly Jews at the loneliest stage of their lives.

He tells us about a sobering conversation he had recently. Over breakfast one morning, a work colleague mentioned that he had not purchased a cemetery plot.

“Is this something we can discuss?” Rabbi Lubin asked.

“No,” the elderly man replied. “There’s nothing to talk about. Me and my wife, we decided we want to be burned.”