My dear friends,
November has sometimes been called the ‘Month of the Dead’ because on 1st November the Church celebrates All Saints Day and on 2nd November All Souls Day. A week later we have Remembrance Sunday.
I have always taken very seriously my ministry to the sick and dying, conducting funeral services and ministry to the bereaved. In my own life I have experienced painful and life-changing bereavements, and so (although every death and bereavement is unique and different) I have some idea of what bereaved people may be going through. I always want to do whatever I can to offer Christian help and hope.
One of the things I have occasionally had to deal with is when someone dies and does not receive the sort of funeral service they said they wanted. I recall one old lady, when I was a curate in Leicestershire in the early 1990s, who told me she wanted her funeral service in the parish church followed by burial in the same grave as her late husband in the churchyard. When she died, the distant relatives who were her heirs organised the plainest possible funeral service at the local crematorium, without even the expense of an organist, followed by the scattering of her ashes amongst the rose bushes in the crematorium garden. There was little I could do because the old lady had not written down her funeral wishes. Could I encourage you, please, to write down what sort of funeral you would like – I have, even the Bible reading and hymns! It makes things much easier for the people making the arrangements. I am happy quietly to talk things over with you, if that might help.
The 1662 Book of Common Prayer contains some very good advice for preparing for one’s death in the service known as the Visitation of the Sick. Here we read:
Then shall the Minister examine whether he [the sick person] repent him truly of his sins, and be in charity with all the world; exhorting him to forgive, from the bottom of his heart, all persons that have offended him; and if he have offended any other, to ask them forgiveness; and where he hath done injury or wrong to any man, that he make amends to the uttermost of his power. And if he hath not before disposed of his goods, let him be admonished to make his Will, and to declare his debts, what he oweth, and what is owing unto him; for the better discharging of his conscience, and the quietness of his Executors. But men should often be put in remembrance to take order for the settling of their temporal estates whilst they are in health.
Very wise and sensible advice for all of us.
I was very interested earlier this year to read a magazine article written by someone who had attended a non-religious funeral conducted by a lay celebrant and then a few days later had been to Christian funeral service in a parish church. The big difference, the author noted, was that the non-religious funeral was all about the past: it was quite nicely done, but crucially it looked backwards at the life of the person who had died. There was no eternal hope, and thus however much it was styled a ‘celebration’ there was an inevitable sense of loss and emptiness.
The Christian funeral the author attended felt quite different. Yes, there was still a sense of loss – bereavement is painful, however much we might pretend otherwise – BUT the big difference was that the Christian funeral service looked to the future. It gave thanks to God for the life on earth of the deceased and looked ahead to his eternal life in the kingdom of Heaven as a result of his personal faith in Jesus Christ’s death and resurrection.
For the Christian, the future is always more important than the past because our future is shared with God Himself. As the Very Rev David L. Edwards, a former Provost of Southwark Cathedral, once pointed out, when we die, the only thing that then matters is the relationship of our soul to God. Jesus Christ himself said: ‘I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly’ [St John, chapter 10, verse 10].
* * *
Looking ahead, Remembrance Sunday this year falls on 10th November. We shall have Requiems with Acts of Remembrance at St Laurence’s Church, Catsfield, at 9.15am and at St George’s Church, Crowhurst, at 10.55am. At 4.00pm we shall have a short open-air service of Remembrance outside St Laurence’s Church with a beacon in a brazier. All are most welcome.
With my love and prayers,
Father Robert.