Where can celebrant funerals take place?

For those who pass away in the ACT there is unfortunately not a lot of options with regards to burial or cremation.

When it opened in 1936, the Woden Cemetery was the main public cemetery in Canberra. It is located near the Woden Town Centre and Canberra Hospital. Plots are available for purchase, but they are limited, so if you want to spend your eternity there, it may be worth purchasing a plot sooner rather than later.

The Gungahlin Cemetery is now Canberra’s major cemetery and is in Mitchell. The cemetery opened in 1979. It includes a natural burial ground and an aboriginal lawn. The natural burial ground is part of the cemetery and allows the deceased to be buried without coffins or headstones.  Loved ones are given coordinates to where their loved ones lie beneath the ground.

The Gungahlin Crematorium was built on the grounds of a cemetery and is the ACT’s only publicly owned crematorium officially opened on 15 March 2021.

There are several other small cemeteries within the ACT borders including one at Hall which is the oldest publicly owned cemetery in the ACT, dedicated in 1883, with the first recorded burial in 1907. It is a small rural cemetery mainly for long-time residents of the Hall region. Hall Cemetery is the last resting place of many of the district’s pioneering families and the well known author Bryce Courtenay was buried there in 2012.

If you want to know more about Canberra’s public cemetery and crematorium have a look at their website. 

Norwood Park Crematorium was built in 1966 on the outskirts of Canberra and is privately owned.  The main Chapel has recently been extended, and services are available Monday to Saturday and the gardens are open 7 days a week from sunrise to sunset including public holidays.

The trend is now to cremate over burial and more and more families are choosing celebrants over religious Ministers to perform the funeral service.

If you have lost a loved one and need help arranging their funeral please feel free to give me a call.