While you might be used to seeing George O’Donnell behind the sound desk at Wellington’s Cathedral of St Paul. He’s also a funeral director and has a passion for helping families navigate a meaningful and healing experience of farewelling their loved ones.  

It was a group of flatmates who first invited George, an atheist at the time, to attend services at St Paul’s Cathedral. It was January 2021 and the middle of the COVID pandemic. George was starting his own private cremation business. It was his attempt to resolve some of the issues he saw in the funeral services industry.  

“There was a psychological neglect, which I would now refer to as spiritual neglect, where you were taught how to move a body but there was no real onboarding for such a vocational role”, he says.  

As a funeral director and Christian, George sees his role as providing care for the bereaved, not just as a profession but as a way of living out his faith. His experiences have taught him that while the funeral service may be the end of a person’s earthly life, it can also be a profound moment of encounter with God’s presence and the hope of resurrection.  

George talks about the common problem of “death denial”, where the significant loss of a loved one is pushed aside, with no real psychological mechanism to deal with it.  

“It’s our everyday practices as Christians that can help with this. There’s this promise that evokes a heavy joy as Christians that while we wait, we have faith. It brings a better coping mechanism for the initial grief and a really strong foundation for healthy mourning practices.”  

It was at a Catholic funeral service that George first felt a profound sense of God’s presence, catching him completely off guard. It took years and the encouragement of close friends for him to eventually accept Jesus into his life, and he found the Cathedral to be an accepting place as he underwent this journey, getting baptised and confirmed on his 30th birthday.  

George also started to appreciate the Christian culture and its role in the care of families following a loss. This includes the value of practical help in the form of providing meals, checking in on the family and helping organise the funeral.  

He realised the private cremation business he had established mostly appealed to clients without faith, as a private cremation is generally led by a family without the involvement of a priest. Wanting to provide opportunities to work with the church, George now offers three options on his website: an unattended cremation, a private cremation, and a bespoke funeral service. He has now held services at several Anglican parishes.  

George says he is honoured to serve the families in his community, providing a space for them to grieve and honour their loved ones with dignity and respect. And he is grateful to share his journey of faith, showing that even those who were once sceptical can come into a deep and meaningful relationship with God.  

By Fiona Roberton