What Is a Celebrant?
Frequently Asked Questions
What Is a Celebrant?
Celebrants are professionals who believe in the power and effectiveness of ceremony and ritual. They collaborate with their clients to create and perform personalized ceremonies that reflect the clients’ beliefs, philosophy of life and personalities; not the Celebrant's.
Where Do Celebrants Officiate?
Celebrants officiate at all types of life ceremonies and rituals including baby namings and adoption ceremonies, coming of age ceremonies, weddings, civil unions and commitment ceremonies, funerals and memorials. Celebrants also develop ceremonies to enrich daily life and for community, corporate and civic events. The opportunities to use ceremony to create connections among neighbors and families, and for healing and celebration, are as varied as are our Celebrants.
How Is a Celebrant Ceremony Unique?
Each ceremony is personal, reflecting who the honorees are either as individuals or as a couple or family. A Celebrant certified by the Celebrant Foundation & Institute will take the time to understand the honorees’ beliefs and values and what makes their ceremony unique.
What Does a Celebrant Do?
In a Celebrant ceremony, the honorees are empowered. Nothing is imposed on them. In a collaborative process, the Celebrant will guide them in choosing rituals, readings, symbols and music to fulfill their ideals and vision for their Ceremony. No two Celebrant ceremonies are the same.
Celebrant services for their honoree client(s) include:
- Meeting at a no-obligation interview to discuss the honoree client’s vision of the ceremony
- Listening and taking notes as they learn the client’s personal story
- Consulting with the client until the ceremony is just right
- Providing a beautiful keepsake copy of the ceremony
Why Choose a Certified Funeral Celebrant?
Here are some of the reasons you might prefer to choose a Certified Celebrant to perform your, funeral, memorial or end-of-life tribute ceremony:
- You want complete freedom in the design of your ceremony and support to create it the way you want
- You want a ceremony that is meaningful, personal and memorable for you
- Your views or spiritual beliefs do not fit in with an established faith, but you embrace a higher force
- You want your ceremony to include your own personal combination of religious, non-religious and cultural or spiritual views
What Do Celebrants Believe?
Celebrants believe that personalized ceremonies are a vital way to bring happiness and balance to individuals, and connection and beauty within society. They believe in people. They believe in adding to the sum total of human happiness wherever they can assist in doing so. Celebrants are trained to focus on the values and priorities of the client, so that the ceremony is a total reflection and extension of the honoree.
How Are Celebrants Trained?
The Celebrant Foundation & Institute is a non-profit educational institution dedicated to helping families personalize celebrations that mark life’s milestones. North American Celebrants are staunchly educated in the art of funeral symbolism and tradition from different cultures and religions. For more information about the Celebrant Foundation & Institute, visit us at www.celebrantusa.org
Do Celebrants Adhere to a Code of Ethics?
Yes! By using a Certified Funeral Celebrant trained by the Celebrant Institute, you are assured that I have agreed to uphold the highest level of service and professionalism.
As a Celebrant Association Member, I have agreed:
- To maintain a professional standard of service to the public.
- To serve each client-honorees with respect, sensitivity and professionalism and to provide all services in timely manner.
- To ensure that clients-honorees have complete choice of and final say over their ceremonies, and that the Celebrant's personal beliefs are immaterial to this process.
- To encourage clients in choosing and/or approving a ceremony that is satisfying to them.
- To respectfully provide a ceremony that is as accurate as possible in all respects, including the pronunciation of the names of people, places and things.
- To meet the client for a no-obligation interview to discuss services prior to engagement.
- To provide unlimited consultation to clients while creating their ceremony.
- To conduct a rehearsal where necessary to the ceremony.
- To perform the ceremony in a professional, prepared and appropriate manner.
- To gift the client/honoree a copy of their ceremony.
- To provide a service that recognizes the unique personalities of your clients, being sensitive to their needs, wishes, values, philosophical and spiritual beliefs and cultural backgrounds.
- Not to discriminate on the basis of gender, race, religion, philosophy of life, ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, or sexual orientation.