April 1, 2025
TOKYO – Increasingly, people are holding proper funerals when they lose their dog, cat or other beloved pet. The ceremonies may be attended by Buddhism priests who read out sutras, and memorial services may follow to mark religious milestones in the afterlife of the pet.
Mourning a pet as you would a family member who has passed could for some mean a sense of closure.
A female company employee in Tokyo held a funeral for her dog, a 16-year-old Labrador retriever, in the ceremonial hall at Kannoji temple in Setagaya Ward, Tokyo, on Feb. 1.
Bright flowers and a photo of the dog were placed on a Buddhist altar and a crate made of willow wood, which served as a coffin, was placed in front of the altar.
While a priest read out sutras, the six funeral attendees joined hands in prayer. The woman was joined by her husband, the couple’s two children now in university, her mother and her younger sister. Her mother and sister had often taken care of the dog.
They placed the retriever’s favorite dog food in front of the door to an incinerator in the ceremonial hall and made their final farewells.
After the cremation, they picked up the dog’s bones and put them into an urn. The process was nearly the same as in a funeral for a person.
“The dog was an important member of my family who had lived with me since its birth,” the woman said. “I was horribly torn up about it, but I was able to send my pet off just as you would a human being.”
She used a funeral plan provided by Setagaya Pet Saijo, a Tokyo-based company that offers cremation services exclusively for pets. Under the plan, a funeral ceremony is held for the pet, the pet is cremated by itself and the owners pick up the bones.
The plan has attracted more and more customers each year, with the company offering the service 50 to 60 times a month.
Costs run around ¥60,000 for a pet weighing one to five kilograms and around ¥80,000 for a pet weighing 25 to 30 kilograms.
If an owner only wishes to cremate their pet, the company also offers group cremation, in which multiple pets are incinerated together.
But an increasing number of people have chosen to hold a funeral in which the pet is cremated by itself and they can pick up the bones.
Post-funeral services
But religious services for pets after death do not end with funerals. There are also services to mark certain milestones.
On Feb. 8, when Kannoji temple held one of the joint memorial services that it holds every month, about 30 people showed up. Often, those who have lost a pet will participate in the services on such occasions as the 49th day since the death — believed to be an important date for departed souls in Buddhism — and the one-year anniversary of the death.
At the memorial services, urns bearing remains are placed on the altar, along with photos of the pets and wooden grave markers called sotoba, on which the full name of the pet is written in ink.
Three Buddhist priests first read out the names of the pets, the name of the family who owned them and the dates of their deaths and then read out sutras, and the attendees each offer incense.
A 61-year-old man, having finished the 49th-day memorial ritual for his dog, buried his pet’s bones in a grave on the temple grounds.
“It was a sudden parting, but I think this memorial service will lend me some closure,” he said. “Since other dogs that were my dog’s walking buddies are buried in the same place, I don’t think it’ll be lonely.”
“Today, most dogs and cats are kept indoors and a sizable number of people regard them as members of their family, no different from their children,” said an official at Japan Pet Ceremony, the Tokyo-based company that runs Setagaya Pet Saijo. “In the past decade, the relationship between owners and pets has grown much deeper.”
Losing a pet
About 40% of pet owners ages 20 to 69 experienced grief after the death of their pet, according to a survey by Suncelmo Co., a Tokyo-based firm that also offers funeral services for pets. The survey was conducted in 2023 and was posed to 391 pet owners.
When asked how they could overcome their grief, about 30% of respondents said holding a funeral would allow them to feel no regret.
Hidenori Ukai, a journalist and Buddhism priest at a temple who wrote a book about funerals for pets, noted that while funeral ceremonies for humans have grown increasingly simple, those for pets have become more elaborate. Sometimes, the pet owner will be joined by those who enjoyed walking the pet, and many people will come together to send off the pet to the afterlife.
“As owners spend more time with their pets and share more spaces with them, the psychological distance between them shrinks,” said Ukai. “That has led to more thoughtful funerals for pets.”
Heiankaku, a company based in Aichi Prefecture that offers services for human ceremonies — such as those to mark a new phase of life and weddings and funerals — opened a funeral hall exclusively for pets in Ichinomiya in May last year.
A ritual performed at the hall called “yukan,” in which the deceased pet is carefully wiped over and cleaned, has proved to be a hit. After the ritual, the body is cremated at the funeral hall. The hall also has an ossuary and a mausoleum.
“The Japanese people have held religious rituals for natural objects and animals since ancient times,” said Midori Kotani, a lecturer at Rikkyo Second Stage College who is an expert on views of life and death. “Today, there are many people who experience grief after the death of their pet. With more people wanting to bury their pets with care, there will likely be growing demand for funerals and burials.”
A woman, who held a memorial service for her cat, said, “I had been weeping for my cat every day. I feel relieved now that I was able to hold the service for my cat.”
Doing your research
There has been a rise in the number of places for enshrining the remains of pets and cemeteries with sections where owner and pet can be buried in the same grave.
Though the bodies of deceased pets are legally treated as waste, this is not true in cases in which pet cemeteries take the bodies and cremate them. There is no law regulating how pets should be buried.
As many procedures are left to the service provider, problems can occur if cremation or burial takes place in a manner different from what the pet owner had expected.
The Nihon Dobutsu Sogi Reien Kyokai, an Ishikawa Prefecture-based business association made up of about 130 companies that offer funeral and related services for pets nationwide, holds exams certifying knowledge of the law and other relevant expertise for such services.
The association requires member companies to clearly disclose their fees and the details of their services.