Clonard celebrates Annual Mass of Remembrance

Nov 30th, 2020

Clonard Mass candles

On Wednesday 25th November, at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer in Clonard, Belfast, the annual Mass of Remembrance for deceased Redemptorists, Oblates, Benefactors and friends of Clonard was celebrated. The Mass was attended by families and relatives who have lost loved ones during the past year. The celebrant and preacher was the Rector Father Peter Burns CSsR.

"Brian is in his late 70's. His wife, Una, died in the early part of last year. They'd been married for over 50 years. Brian was simply heart-broken. Their children are all married and some of them live far away. So Brian was on his own. The thing he found hardest was the empty house. Especially if he'd been out somewhere - at Mass or doing a bit of shopping. Opening the door and going into the house when Una was no longer there; or lying in bed at night on his own.

It was really impossible to offer him any comfort. He was simply heart-broken.

I hadn't met him for quite a while. Until recently. I asked him how he was. And he told me two things had happened over the past eighteen months:

First of all, he began to have a strong sense of Una's presence with him. He felt she was close. And he even began to talk to her. This, he said, made all the difference to him.

And secondly, as the weeks and months passed, he became more and more aware of what a gift she had been and how blessed he was that they had such a long and happy life together.

Not that they didn't have ups and downs in their relationship. But they were close and had a deep affection for one another. As his awareness of this grew, he became more and more grateful for Una - and he thanked God for her, and for their children, and for their grandchildren.

All this didn't mean that he no longer missed her; or that he wasn't at times still very lonely.

But as he grew in gratitude, the texture of his grief changed: it softened and became less painful. And he began to pick up the pieces of his life: you could even say he began to live again.

This evening/in November we are remembering our loved ones who have died.

We remember them with love. And we remember them with gratitude for the gift they were; for their goodness to us; for their kindness and their generosity; for the way they witnessed to their faith.

But do we, I wonder, remember them as alive?

Brian certainly remembered Una as alive. The words used by the Church in the Vigil for the Dead would resonate with him: We believe that all the ties of friendship and affection which knit us as one throughout our lives, do not unravel with death.

Do we believe that? Do we believe that that there is an afterlife? That our loved one who has died continues to live?

Sometimes, I think, we say, and say it sincerely, that we do believe our loved ones continue to live with God after they die. But do we believe, then, that our relationship with them also continues?

Isn't it often the case that we live on the basis that they're gone from us, and that we no longer have any relationship with them or that they have any relationship with us? The only way we imagine we can keep our relationship alive is by holding them in our hearts and our memories.

So, we pray this evening for a deeper faith in life after death; we pray for a faith which dares to believe that we can continue to be in close relationship with those we loved who have died - and they with us.

Because, as the Vigil Service says: "all ties of friendship and affection that knit us as one throughout our lives, do not unravel with death.

AMEN"

After Father Peter's homily, candles were lit in honour of loved ones, their names were read and people in the congregation stood up when they heard the name of their loved one. They could take their candle home at the end of the service or leave it in the church to be placed at the altar of Saint Joseph, the patron saint of a happy death.

Those who were remembered were:

Father Matt Ryan, C.Ss.R.

Father James Duggan, C.Ss.R.

Father Peter Flannery C.Ss.R

Michael Robinson - Reader

Celine Mc Grattan - Reader

Roma Tumelty - Reader

Gerry McVeigh - Choir, Cantor

Peggy Hammond - Choir

Billy Donnelly - Flower ministry - Eucharistic Minister

Anne Cappa - Father Brendan McConvery's sister

Pauline Cassidy - Father Gerry Cassidy's sister