Ashes to ashes

Chart from The Economist

In 1909 only 0.2% of people were cremated in England & Wales, today it is 75% (interestingly though it is only 18% in Northern Island, source).

What does that say about our culture that cremations haven't been this popular since before the conversions of the Anglo-Saxons?

Are we becoming Panthesistic as Tom Wright suggests the scattering of ashes implies ('the underlying assumption [is] of a desire to be simply merged back into the created world, without any affirmation of a future life of embodiment', Surprised by Hope, p.32)?

Or are we so concerned about the ephemeral spirit that the body is now only and instrument to carry the soul which can be destroyed to set the spirit free (a bit like some Eastern religions?)?

Or perhaps we are so agressively materialistic that the cheapest, most space-efficient and hygenic way of disposing of bodies is to be preferred (as the pioneers in the UK argued)?

Answers on a postcard.