ANYONE who has ever been married, or maybe had to organise a funeral service, will be well aware of the difficulties of finding suitable words.

Poets, philosophers, essayists and song-writers have between them produced several forests-worth of words to mark the important moments in our lives, but finding the right ones that say what you want to say can be like looking for a needle in a haystack.

At traditional church services, the clergy can come up with biblical and other readings suitable for the occasion, but what about people who may feel somewhat hypocritical about taking part in such a service, because they have no religious convictions of their own?

Now Moreton resident Nigel Collins, the one-time national ceremonies co-ordinator for the British Humanist Association, has compiled a new anthology of prose and poetry, which he hopes will serve to suit almost every non-religious occasion.

Called Seasons of Life, the anthology contains well over 200 selections, some well-known and others much less so, and as well as a source of public words, it is also intended for private reflection.

It is divided into sections for funerals, weddings and naming ceremonies and each of these is sub-divided to provide for different scenarios and tastes. Typical is a short piece by Matthew Arnold from the Funerals section: -

Is it so small a thing

To have enjoy'd the sun,

To have lived light in the Spring,

To have loved, to have thought, to have done...?

Since becoming a humanist celebrant Mr Collins has conducted hundreds of ceremonies, and he says in his introduction to the book: "The rites of passage that form part of our culture existed long before the institutions where most people are used to seeing them today.

"Namings go back thousands of years, and weddings and funeral ceremonies are as old as humanity itself. All of them are shaped by a natural human impulse, present in the majority, to mark significant events in their lives with some kind of ceremony or ritual."

The greatest demand for humanist ceremonies comes for funerals, and it was after attending a number of family funerals a decade ago that Mr Collins decided to train as a humanist celebrant. He had already adopted humanism as a belief system after finding that Christian churches just did not suit him.

Humanism, he explained, is an umbrella term for those wanting to retain morals and ethics, but without the belief in God.

As the British Humanist Association membership has expanded, his role has changed and he is now regional co-ordinator for South Central England, travelling far and wide to conduct ceremonies, always talking to the people involved beforehand to come up with a mutually-suitable form of ceremony.

Seasons of Life, priced £9.99, is published by the Rationalist Press Association, 47 Theobalds Road, London, WC1X 8SP, and is available from book shops and from the association.