The husband of a couple from our parish whom I knew well died this week. He will be buried on Saturday. He was 92. The Funeral Mass will be held at noon. Family will receive guests beginning at 11a.m until the Mass. I don't know if there was a private family wake. The brief public funeral structure is typical of older people. Often no one but family members are around anymore. Of course, the pandemic helped to solidify brief funerals.
However, he and his wife were both long time members of the choir so the parish will have the equivalent of a royal funeral music wise! Sixteen choir members distributed over SATB with piano, flute and trumpet. The music program follows. You may recognize some of the titles.
Preludes
Be With Me Lord
This is Holy Ground
O Breathe On Me
Sacred Silence
I The Lord
Gathering Hymn: On Eagle’s Wings
Psalm “Shepherd
Me, O God”
Alleluia. Something Which is Known
Preparation Hymn Eye Has Not Seen
Communion: I Have Loved You
Reflection: You Are Mine
Commendation: Songs of the Angels
Missioning: Servant Song
Betty and I will not be attending because of the pandemic. I am not sure that the funeral will be livestream although our parish has the ability of doing so. It probably depends upon availability of camera person, wishes of family and funeral director, etc.
So, I searched YouTube for all the hymns. Click on this link.
Betty and I will hold our private wake here at home this evening.
We will add Evening Prayer from the Office of the Dead. This is sung by a priest alone, but he uses the Saint Meinrad Psalms tones so we should be able sing along. It takes about fifteen minutes.
EVENING PRAYER
The Liturgy of the Hours: According to the Roman Rite
Hymns: Hymnal for the Hours by Fr. Samuel F. Weber, O.S.B.
Antiphons: Gaudete Psalter: For the Liturgy of the Hours
Psalm Tones: St. Meinrad Psalm Tones, Saint Meinrad Archabbey
Tomorrow morning we will sing Morning Prayer from the Office of the Dead. Again about fifteen minutes and wait to see if the Mass is livestreamed.
MORNING PRAYER
The Liturgy of the Hours: According to the Roman Rite
Hymns: Hymnal for the Hours by Fr. Samuel F. Weber, O.S.B.
Antiphons: Gaudete Psalter: For the Liturgy of the Hours
Psalm Tones: St. Meinrad Psalm Tones, Saint Meinrad Archabbey
The Office of the Dead can be said any day that there is not a feast or obligatory memorial.
I think Friday Evening and Saturday Morning are a good time for this since it covers the period which Christ spent in the tomb. There is both the sadness of his death and the looking forward to his Resurrection.
Since funerals now take place with little public mourning, NewGathering and others may find these materials useful to do your own memorials either personally or in small groups just as Betty and I are doing for my friends.
The music selections sound like a lot of the ones we use here for funerals. My husband has a book, The Order of Christian Funerals, including a Cremation Rite, and the Office of the Dead. It is the one approved by the USCCB, I would Imagine that Jim has it also. K has done a lot of vigils, and a few committals at cemeteries, and of course has assisted at quite a few funeral Masses. Sometimes the funerals fill the church, and at other times there are barely a dozen people in attendance. Sometimes people have outlived most of their family, which is sad.
ReplyDeleteOccasionally my choir is asked to sing for a funeral. They nearly always ask us for Amazing Grace. And How Great Thou Art for a recessional. I like to play that one, it flows nicely.
Even I recognize the names of a lot of those hymns. From the olden days. Have are they being replaced with others as time goes by?
ReplyDeleteWell, they're the hymns that replaced the ones out of the black St. Basil hymnal or the blue St. Gregory ones we used to have, copyright date about 1920. When I visit our sons and families their parishes have newer songs than the Glory 'n Praise classics, but I'm not sure they're better. The cathedral uses a more formal hymnal. Actually it seems kind of Anglican. I like it, but not sure it would fly in our parish. Especially if they had to spend money on it.
DeleteThe Servant Song might get my vote as the official anthem for deacons, if there is a need for such a thing.
ReplyDeleteThere's Servant Song, by Donna Marie McCargill, and The Servant Song, by Richard Gillard. Both are pretty.
DeletePerhaps it is a misperception on my part, but my sense is that people don't take the funeral and burial rites as seriously as they used to. Perhaps part of it is, with cremation so common now, the urgency of getting the body into the ground has waned. I see memorial services happening, sometimes months or even (especially during the time of COVID) years after the person died. And I sense that fewer people feel obligated to show up for vigils, funerals and burials.
ReplyDeleteIt seems like most Catholic families here still opt for funerals. With cremation they might delay it a bit. I think people need to communicate what they want to their families, and designate funds to cover it. We both have life insurance policies enough to cover final expenses.
DeleteI'm glad the church has relaxed about cremations. We don't want to be cremated, but it is definitely the less expensive option, and that sometimes is the deciding factor.
And now there's composting which the RCC considers wrong. I sort of agree although it may be better for the environment than cremation. Best thing would be old fashioned burial in the ground without embalming and metal, just natural decomposition. I think that would be most respectful.
DeleteI don't know what current Jewish custom is but it used to be burial on the same day, or the next, with no embalming and in a shroud.
DeleteStanley, that’s known as a green burial and it’s what I want if possible. More and more cemeteries are setting aside part of it for green burials. There are several now in Pennsylvania. When I was first looking into this about ten years ago, there were probably fewer than a dozen places where you could have a green burial.
Deletehttps://www.greenburialcouncil.org/cemeteries.html
If my husband and I are still living on the east coast, this is where we want to be buried ( in a shroud - no casket) and we have written instructions about it with our trust papers. I go to the monastery now and then because it’s beautiful and peaceful.
https://www.virginiatrappists.org/cemetery/
Katherine, you are correct about Jewish burials within 24 hours. However this is pushed tomSunday if the death is on Friday. No embalming, but caskets are permitted - at least they were at the Jewish funerals I’ve attended. More Jewish funerals than Catholic.
DeleteOff- topic. There is a new documentary starting this weekend on wPBS stations. It’s called “Once upon a Time in Northern Ireland”. We have been streaming it but it will be also be available to people without PBS Passport this weekend. I think I’m the only Irish American here, and that the others are of Polish and Scandinavian heritage.I also have German heritage but have always identified with the Irish side - maternal. I look Irish American actually, not German. Anyway, it’s an interesting series about The Troubles. My great grandparents were not from the north, but I have a long-standing interest in Irish history ( I’ve been to England about a dozen times. Also have visited Scotland and Wales - but not Ireland. On the bucket list now).
ReplyDeleteI recommend the series as a frightening example of the results of injustice combined with tribalism. Watching it I can’t help but wonder if something similar could happen here next year. Many scenes brought back images of the Black Lives Matter protests especially, and of Jan 6.
If anyone watches it I would love to read your thoughts and reactions to it.
I will see if my husband is interested in it, he is about 100% Irish. His ancestors were from County Sligo, they came over here prior to the Civil War. On my mother's side, some forebearers were Scots-Irish, from the Belfast area. They too came over prior to the Civil War. I don't know for sure, but I think both families were escaping the Potato Famine. Mom's relatives on that side were Presbyterian. My husband's were originally Catholic, but they had lost that thread several generations ago.
DeleteIt sounds like an interesting series.
Tribalism. Sometime around 1980 thé ( Anglican) daughter of an English friend stayed with us for a couple of weeks with a friend of hers from Belfast- both college girls.The Irish girl was Protestant/ Presbyterian Scots- Irish heritage and she mentioned the violence and bombings in Belfast a few times because she was fascinated by the fact that my Protestant husband and I could be married here without it causing violence from family and/ or community. She talked of the bombings in Belfast as something you just learned to live with ( like Israel today). She told us that the Protestant kids and Catholic kids often socialized together in clubs, but never let their parents know about it. This is in the documentary too. When she left us she told us that she was so happy to meet us because she thought that marriages like ours SHOULD be acceptable. I told her that we aren’t unique - that we knew many catholic-Protestant married couples. She was happy to know that Protestants and Catholics didn’t hate each other everywhere. I’ve been remembering her while watching this series, shocked by the film and images showing the breadth and depth of the hate and violence she grew up with.
DeleteKatherine, Wiki has a summary of the potato famine. It apparently primarily impacted the south and west of Ireland, where my ancestors were from. They left Ireland a few years before the potato blight. Sligo is in the northwest, not near Belfast. My great- grands were from County Kerry ( great- grandfather) and Roscommon ( great- grandmother), which is southeast of Sligo, more or less in the middle of the country.
Deletehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)
I have read that part of the reason the potato famine was so severe was that all the potatoes in Ireland were descended from one plant. So, there was a lack of genetic diversity that might have protected some of the crops from blight. Of course it happened against the background of oppression and poverty which made things so much worse.
DeleteAnne and all - our local Chicago PBS station showed the first two episodes of the Northern Ireland documentary tonight. I found it edge-of-the-seat gripping.
DeleteThings that struck me:
* The IRA troubles were so...modern. I thought they went back much farther than the late '60s/early '70s. I'm really struggling to wrap my brain around these Europeans stoning, beating and bombing one another. Belfast looked so modern, but it was like they were fighting the 30 Years War.
* My heart really went out to the people they were interviewing. It seemed the memories were retraumatizing them.
* The role of rock n roll music as a way to overcome the sectarian divisions was really striking
* I am hoping that forgiveness plays a role in the story as it continues. My sense is that, for these folks (some of whom were active participants in the mayhem, others of whom were simply victims), they've moved on with their lives, and perhaps they have healed at least partially. Some of them clearly have sought to transform their lives in light of their experiences.
Jim, we finished streaming the last episode last night. It is one of the most intense documentaries I’ve ever seen. I won’t give away the stories, but there are more to come. I looked up reviews and several were from people who grew up in Belfast during that era. Some said they cried. One said that she couldn’t watch the two final episodes. One said that she left for university ( where ? - maybe in England) and never went back to Ireland. They were in Ireland and the UK where it was broadcast earlier than here. The college student from Belfast who stayed with us was so casual about commenting about the bombings that I didn’t pick up the intensity. She did talk about the music clubs as being where the Catholic and Protestant kids could meet and just be young people together - as long as the parents didn’t find out. Watching the scenes of violence brought back vivid memories for me of sitting in front of the TV with my husband and son in California for hours watching the violence at the US Capitol on Jan 6. I realized from comments here that others weren’t as deeply affected as we were - maybe because they were played out in our hometown. The Capitol isn’t just an official government building to us, but a place we’ve seen thousands of time, a building we’ve been in many times, a place where friends and family worked. Most importantly it is the symbol of our country, our democracy, a place which had not been attacked since the British - now under seigle by Americans trying to overthrow the election. So many Americans seem not to have truly grasped the significance of that attack and believe it was “patriotic”. Now they’re ready to re-elect the traitorous president who egged them on. A man who literally hugs the flag while trying to destroy the constitution.
DeleteIt also brings back memories of the Black Lives Matter protests in DC, and elsewhere - the lashing out to protest repeated violent treatment of African Americans by police added to decades of built up rage against continuing injustice.
Tribalism + injustice. The rise in open tribalism in this country is a bad sign. They were all white complexions Belfast, allegedly all Christians. Religious tribalism instead of racial or ethnic.
I remind myself of the bombings, shootings and violence of the 60 s and early 70 s and that we got through it. But then we didn’t have a president trying to overthrow an election, nor did we have one of the two major political parties defending that effort, calling the election fraudulent, defending the Big Lie, and working overtime to disenfranchise poor, African American voters. We’re headed backwards in this country. Many in Northern Ireland fear a return to violence even now. My son had a business trip to Belfast a few years ago. When he gave them his dates they told him to cut off a couple of days because they ( a very small specialist company) would all be leaving town. Every year in Northern Ireland they have big parades all over to celebrate the 17th century Battle of the Boyne - when the Protestant king defeated the deposed Catholic king. The Orangemen have big parades, and in Belfast, there is apparently still often some violence. So this small company declares a holiday and everyone leaves town. My son was shocked because he thought the Troubles were ancient history by now.
Orangemen parades are probably the equivalent of lionizing the Confederacy except the Confederacy lost. Same dynamic. Patriotism at its worst is just mass egoism. If it was just a celebration of the good things, it would be great. But too often it's forgetting or glossing over the bad stuff.
DeleteOur pastor when I was in grade school (and he was the one baptized me as a baby) was from Ireland. He was soft spoken and scholarly, had a bit of a brogue, but seemed to have thoroughly assimilated into American life. His niece from Ireland came over to visit and spent a few months on our town. My mom made friends with her and said that she was still fighting the Battle of Boyne, had nothing at all good to say about the British, quite different than her uncle. Don't know if Mom ever told her about the branch of the family that was Scots Irish, LOL.
DeleteAbout Jan 6 and the attack on the capitol, it is true that it wasn't our hometown. But we all saw the footage and were horrified. It was one of those things like Kennedy's assassination, or the Twin Towers on 9/11, or I suppose Pearl Harbor day for our parents. We will always remember where we were and what we were doing that day.
That January 6 happened, besides being a major problem in its own right, obviously is an indicator of a deeper social problem of some magnitude.
DeleteWhat may be even more worrisome is that so many Americans believe the Trump's Stop the Steal rhetoric, and what that portends for the 2024 election.
Responsible voices in the US, including mainstream media, have been saying for four years now that Trump lost the 2020 election - but a sizeable minority of Americans either isn't exposed to mainstream voices, or doesn't believe mainstream voices.
I read yesterday that the recent wave of criminal indictments seems to have incrementally reduced Trump's support among white voters. Even a reduction of a few percentage points of white votes for Trump makes it exceedingly unlikely that he could win a two-person race against Joe Biden.
But Trump's true believers, having been imbibing Stop the Steal poison for the last four years, won't believe any outcome except a Trump victory.
As bad as January 6 was, it could be much worse this next time around. Perhaps instead of mayhem being focused in one place, it would happen in many places.
In my view, Republican leaders and right-wing media bear a great deal of responsibility for fostering the Stop the Steal rhetoric over the last four years. These influencers must step up and tell the truth, about 2020 and also about 2024.
Jim -
DeleteAs bad as January 6 was, it could be much worse this next time around. Perhaps instead of mayhem being focused in one place, it would happen in many places.
That’s exactly what I am afraid of - if he is found guilty and sentenced to jail, or if he runs and loses again. In his interview with Carlson trump not only repeated his promise to pardon the “ heroes “ of Jan 6, he implied that actions taken against him just might lead to more violence. Not that he is encouraging it, of course, but who can blame these patriots for defending our country?
I am not holding my breath for his enablers to come clean. We know from the lawsuit against Fox that Tucker Carlson and others knew that he had really lost, while perpetuating the lie. But now they’re buddy buddy again. None of them will admit that they perpetuated the lies even while realizing the truth.
Trump is their path to power - to totally changing the laws of this country to turn it into what is essentially a one party authoritarian government, as they have already managed to do in most red states, including Ohio. I had hoped that 2020 would end this, but it’s simply building and it very well may truly explode into a nationwide Belfast situation in the next 15 months. The Atlantic has an article today about the cult called MAGA and says it will only die when the over 65 whites die, because most younger folk don’t buy into it. But if 2024 doesn’t defeat it, those younger people won’t even have a chance to defeat MAGA through non- violent means. It’s not a cheery future that we’re looking at. And the younger MAGA fanatics that will replace the more than 4000 current administration types ( promised by all the unholy Trinity) will be eager to secure their places on the ladder that will enable them to climb into powerful senior positions as they get older .