Bathing corpses is a dying profession

Bathing corpses is a dying profession

PALEMBANG, South Sumatra: The South Sumatra Office of the Ministry of Religious Affairs has been encouraging schools to organize crash courses on how to bathe corpses because fewer people are taking up the profession nowadays, Antara reported.

Azom Romli, the chief of the office, said the skill is still taught at some schools over holiday breaks such as Ramadhan.

In Islam, a corpse must be bathed completely before it is covered by unbleached cotton cloth and buried.

Azom said that it is becoming more and more difficult to find people qualified to carry out the bathing. (emb)