論寺廟附設納骨設施之使用的法律困境

Exploring the Legal Dilemma of Uses at Affiliated Columbaria Facilities of Temples

殯葬設施的設置前提，必須是提供並且要盡可能地滿足社會需求為主要目標。其中，有關納骨設施方面，目前國內之納骨設施大致可分為公立納骨塔、私立納骨塔、寺廟附設納骨塔及教會附設之納骨塔等等，原則上各有其不同的管理方式，但仍不得違反《殯葬管理條例》及其相關之規定。另就取得塔位使用權利之方式而言，依國內目前現況，有依消費方式（即買賣）而取得該塔位之所有權或永久使用權者（例如：私立納骨塔）；有依捐款方式而取得該塔位之使用權利者（例如：寺廟或教會附設之納骨塔）；亦有依申請登記並繳納類似於管理費方式而取得該塔位之使用權利者（例如：公立納骨塔）。無論以上述之何種方式取得，其主要目的即為使其親人之骨灰（骸），得以存放並且永久安息為依歸。然而一般民眾，往往無法深入探究該等之法律關係為何，甚而即便是取得「永久使用權」，惟其究竟是何等權利，並非清楚。再則，目前國內的寺廟所附設之納骨設施，其接受信徒或一般民眾的親人骨灰存放於該寺廟附設之納骨設施，則其性質上究竟是屬於買賣、租賃、僱傭、使用，抑或是寄託等問題，仍有探究之必要。

"Prerequisites of establishing a funeral facility shall be serving the main goal of provision as well as satisfying the needs by the society as much. For the establishment, concerning columbaria facilities, the current columbaria facilities in the country may be roughly categorized as public columbaria, private columbaria, temple-affiliated columbaria, and church-affiliated columbaria, whose managements can essentially be different yet without violation against the“Mortuary Service Administration Act”and relevant provisions. Moreover, in terms of obtaining use rights for urn niches in the current domestic industry, there are ownership or permanently preserved use rights obtained in consumptions (i.e. purchase) (e.g. private columbaria); use rights for the urn niche obtained through donations (e.g. columbaria attached to a temple or a church); use rights for the urn niche obtained through application and registration for use with cost covered by user payments similar to management fee (e.g. public columbaria), etc. Regardless of applied method, the main purpose of such use is to allow the ashes (remains) of the relatives to be stored, allowing them permanently rest in peace at a settled location with dependence. However, an ordinary civilian may be unable to conduct an in-depth exploration on the legal relationship of such behavior plus the comprehension on the essence of rights concerning obtaining“permanently preserved use right”. In addition, in the columbaria facilities attached to domestic temples at present time, there’s a service of accepting storages of ashes of the relatives by their believers or general civilians, whose attribute as trade, rental, employment, use or entrusting needs to be further explored."