I'm Michelle Sponseller, a Certified Master Celebrant and Certified Funeral Celebrant based in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. I serve as officiant for personalized end-of-life ceremonies - funerals, memorials, celebrations of life, and graveside services - for families across central Michigan and beyond. I also serve as End-of-Life Instructor at the Celebrant Academy, training the next generation of celebrants in this work.​

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How I Came To This Work

For more than twenty years, I served my community through local government. It taught me that a community isn't held together by policies or programs. It's held together by stories. The story of the family that's been here for generations. The story of the building that almost wasn't saved. The story of the person who showed up to every meeting, on every cold night, because something mattered to them.

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​That conviction is what brought me to celebrant work. The care for stories. The respect for what people carry. Applied now to one of the most important days a family will ever live through.

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The Craft

End-of-life ceremonies are changing.

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More families today are looking for something that doesn't fit a single religious tradition. Or any tradition at all. They want a service that sounds like the person who died, not a script. Not a template. Not a stranger reading from notes prepared by another stranger.

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They want someone who knows how to listen for a life.

I listen first. To family. To friends and colleagues. To the stories they tell, and to the ones they almost tell. I gather the small details that make a person who they were. The contradictions. The phrases they used. The chair they always sat in. The things only their family knows.

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Then I write the ceremony to fit the life. Not the other way around.

Religious. Non-religious. Interfaith. Cultural traditions. Family or community rituals. Anything in between. The shape of the service follows the family's wishes and the truth of the person being remembered.​​

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And then I lead the service. I tell their story - the way it was lived, the moments that made it theirs - for the people who knew them best. I make room for the laughter. I make room for the tears. Telling a life's story well is its own kind of work, and I take it as seriously as the writing.

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In addition to officiating funerals, memorials, and graveside services, I also write eulogies for family members who want help finding the words. I write obituaries that sound like the person rather than a template. I consult with families designing their own services. And I clean headstones for graves that have weathered with time.​​

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The work of remembrance takes many forms. I'm glad to be part of whichever one a family needs.

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Beyond The Work

Mt. Pleasant has been home to my family for generations. It's where I live, where I work, and where I serve families across central Michigan.

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I also welcome speaking engagements - for funeral industry gatherings, hospice teams, end-of-life doula organizations, community groups, and anyone curious about how we mark the end of a life.​​

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If you'd like to talk, whether you're a family facing a loss, a funeral professional considering a partnership, or someone called to this work yourself, I'd be glad to hear from you.​​