John Christian Phifer’s life revolves around death. He performed his first burial at the age of six, wrapping a grasshopper in a shroud of leaves, and today he digs bigger graves on a sweeping nature preserve in the hills of Tennessee. With each funeral, the land is restored and loved ones have wide open space to grieve and to celebrate the life we all are so lucky to live. Hear how John Christian went from mortician to man with a life-giving mission in this first episode of HOPE season 2. 

To find out more about Larkspur, visit LarkspurConservation.org and follow John Christian on Instagram.

Hosted and produced by Kate Tucker, Hope Is My Middle Name is a podcast by Consensus Digital Media in collaboration with Reasonable Volume.