1. In the literature, I came across a notion of “sacred waste” only once: in an article by Phyllis Passariello (1994) on the ritual (re)use of the human body and its parts, remains and excrements, the placenta in particular. Hence, Passariello basically deals with the sacrality and the sacralization of human waste departing from the question “is anything that once was part of a human ever considered pure waste by humans” (1994: 110, italics in original). In my view, however, sacred waste is a much broader and more encompassing concept.
2. See Thoden van Velzen and Van Wetering on the “sacred dump” of the Surinamese Maroon Gaan Tata cult (2004: 134–6).
3. The recent suggestion of the Dutch Bible Association (NBG) to recycle old Bibles into paper for printing new Bibles both illustrates the difficulty of discarding sacred material and the absence of protocol (Reformatorisch Dagblad, January 12, 2013).