Homily delivered by Bishop Leo O’Reilly
on The Day For Life
at St Patrick’s Church, Glangevlin, Co. Cavan, 3rd October 2010
After this Mass I will bless the new extension to the graveyard here and also take part in the annual blessing of the graves in the parish. Today is the annual Day for Life in our Church’s calendar. The Church here and in Scotland, Wales and England dedicate this day to celebrating the dignity of human life from beginning to end, from conception until natural death. The Day for Life might not seem the most appropriate day for blessing a new graveyard, or indeed for blessing the graves in the old one. But in fact it is very suitable because this year the Day for Life theme is the meaning of Christian death and the care of those who are dying.
Here in Ireland, especially in rural Ireland, we treat death quite differently than in other countries like England and America. I suppose you could say we are more comfortable around death than they are. We go to wakes, we attend funerals in great numbers, we have month’s memory and anniversary masses for the dead, we have the annual blessing of the graves. I’ve been at funerals in England and America and you might not have a dozen people there. They don’t have wakes at home as we do. Everything to do with death is kept at arms length so that you don’t even have to think about it if possible.
The Bishops have published a pastoral letter to mark this day. Copies are available at the back for those who want them. The letter has the title “Lord for your faithful people, life is changed, not ended”. You’ll recognise those words – they come from the preface of the Mass for the dead and they sum up our faith. Christ has conquered death by his resurrection. In Christ, “death is no longer our end but our ‘Passover’ into …life forever beyond the experience of death.
So death is not the end but the beginning of the new life of the resurrection. It is the transition from life on earth to the life of glory in heaven. In this bigger picture which we see by faith, death is part of life. It is a stage on the journey of the follower of Christ. The bishops’ letter says: “Human death is not only a physical and psychological process; it is also a spiritual reality”. There’s more to it than the heartbeat stopping, or the brain ceasing to function. Ideally the person who is dying should be helped to make it a personal offering of themselves to God, a conscious embracing of the moment that enables them to say with Jesus: Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
All of that presumes faith, faith in God, faith in Jesus, faith in the resurrection and eternal life. Our faith assures us that we are not alone as we face death. “We are”, in the words of today’s letter, “enfolded in the community of faith which carries us in this world and in the next”. We have the sacraments and the prayers of the Church to support us – the sacrament of reconciliation which brings us forgiveness, the sacrament of the sick which comforts and consoles us, and Holy Communion for the dying (Viaticum) which strengthens us for the journey to eternal life.
Ultimately it is only our faith with can make sense of death and dying. It is only faith which can enable us to see that human life is still sacred when a person is terminally ill and in great pain. It is only the conviction that this person’s pain is a sharing in the suffering of Christ that can make sense of it and help that person to endure it with courage and patience. The prayer of the apostles in today’s gospel is the most important prayer of all: “Lord, increase our faith”. It’s a prayer we can say at any time. We can repeat it over and over and be sure we will never say it too often. Faith is what takes the sting out of death, faith in Christ who rose from the dead and gives us new life in the resurrection.
May I take this opportunity of complimenting and expressing appreciation to all who were involved in the provision of this very necessary extension to the cemetery. Congratulations to all on a job well done.
