Does the Catholic Church forbid cremation?
At no period in the history of Catholicism was the practice of cremation ever adopted or favored in the Catholic Church. From the very beginning, burial of the dead, i.e., inhumation, was an inviolable practice in the Church and she struggled constantly against cremation, a pagan custom often accompanied by rites incompatible with the Catholic Faith. Under Boniface VIII whoever practiced cremation was excommunicated and the remains even of the corpse were refused Christian burial. With the advent of the French Revolution in 1789 an attempt was made on November 11, 1796 to introduce cremation; it met with no success. It was only as a result of Masonic influence and pressure that in the final quarter of the 19th century the idea of cremation became fashionable and certain governments gave it official recognition. The campaign was begun in Italy and the first experiments took place in 1872 by Brunetti in Padua, and in April 1873, the Italian Senate gave approval, and, in Milan on January
