Carol, thank you for posting this. Although I haven't experienced anything near the depth of this kind of tragedy, I have lost friends and relatives and have attended both formal religious funerals and non-religious memorials. The most moving were those arranged by friends of the deceased and without religious content. A recent one was held outdoors in the mountains (a friend who was outdoorsy). People got up and told their favorite stories of our friend, there was a table set up with a memorial book for the family, there were posters with photos of the deceased and the ceremony ended with bagpipes. We had food and gathered around talking. No one says he's in a better place or any other sorts of nonsense. What I think the important difference about this is, that the church tells us what we should be feeling, what we should think, how we should handle life transitions. When we take these matters into our own hands, they become more meaningful. Religion can only give you shallow platitudes. I've long thought that saying about God not giving us more than we can handle was bs. I don't know how that got started.
Be strong.