New Victorian funeral facility launched
Non-Orthodox Jewish families in Victoria have been given a wider choice of Jewish funerals with the launch of Tobin Brothers Jewish Funerals.
NON-Orthodox Jewish families in Victoria have been given a wider choice of Jewish funerals with the launch of Tobin Brothers Jewish Funerals (TBJF).
TBJF, a division of Tobin Brothers Funerals, invited Jewish community leaders, including Jewish Care, Access Inc and Progressive rabbis to a launch event in Melbourne last week.
Brad Klibansky, Jewish funerals manager at Tobin Brothers, said the new division means Jewish families can now have a direct interface with a funeral company that is specifically attuned to the needs of Jewish families.
TBJF is offering funerals and cremations at 23 cemeteries in Melbourne and one in Echuca, with access to Jewish practitioners of Tahara (purification of the body before burial), a dedicated Jewish mortuary and its own crematory facility.
“We have a range of highly trained Jewish funeral planners and conductors who understand and respect the needs of the liberal Jewish community,” Klibansky said.
Although TBJF expects to attract some families who would otherwise use the Melbourne Chevra Kadisha, its arrival will have a deeper impact on Bet Olam Jewish Funerals, the burial society of Progressive Judaism Victoria (PJV).
Contacted by The AJN, Bet Olam’s chair Barry Fradkin said Bet Olam, which uses Nelson Bros Funeral Services, “is a not-for-profit Progressive community-owned group” and all of its income after costs is returned to the Progressive Jewish community through the PJV for the benefit of Progressive shules and organisations.
Fradkin said members of PJV-affiliated shules and groups receive concessional rates for funeral-related fees.
Families using Bet Olam’s facilities for funerals and, in some cases, cremations, deal with Bet Olam and its volunteers, rather than a commercial company.
There is a growing team of Tahara volunteers and funerals are conducted by a Progressive rabbi, or where requested, a lay leader trained by one of its rabbis, he said.
Klibansky said TBJF will offer the services of Jewish celebrants Henry Buch and Kendra Abay for its funeral services.
PJV rabbis sometimes officiate at burials conducted by various funeral companies, and Klibansky said TBJF has spoken to Progressive rabbis who stated they would officiate at TBJF funerals.
However, contacted by The AJN, Rabbi Kim Ettlinger of Temple Beth Israel, and a member of the Va’ad, the Victorian Progressive rabbis’ executive, would only say she expects “further conversations with all the parties”.
PETER KOHN
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