Even at the Grave

I have had a lot of inquiries about funerals lately.  We had the funeral of a long-time, much loved parishioner recently, and I'm sure that's what started everyone thinking about the topic.  Maybe I imagined it, but I also sensed some surprise at what the funeral was like.  I think our Episcopal funerals often take us by surprise, no matter how many we've been to before, because they are so unlike what we are conditioned to expect at a funeral.

In the Book of Common Prayer, we have instructions throughout that are printed in a small, italicized font.  Called rubrics, because originally they were printed in red, they, like all of our prayerbook, give an indication of what we believe.  Lex orandi, lex credendi - the law of prayer is the law of belief - holds true not just for the words we use in worship but for the instructions about how we worship.

In my home parish, before a funeral began, the priest would stand at the back of the church and read the rubrics on page 507:

The liturgy for the dead is an Easter liturgy. It finds all its meaning in the resurrection. Because Jesus was raised from the dead, we too, shall be raised.

The liturgy, therefore, is characterized by joy, in the certainty that "neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ

Jesus our Lord."

This joy, however, does not make human grief unchristian. The very love we have for each other in Christ brings deep sorrow when we are parted by death.  Jesus himself wept at the grave of his friend. So, while we rejoice that one we love has entered into the nearer presence of our Lord, we sorrow in sympathy with those who mourn.

It wasn't until I went to seminary that I figured out that these words weren't actually part of the liturgy.  But I know why he felt compelled to read them to the congregation.  Those words express perfectly how we view death and why we conduct our funerals the way we do.

The comments I get from people following one of our funerals are always positive.  I try not to take those comments personally, because I know the truth.  The music we choose, the flowers we have, the words of the homilist, all these things contribute to the overall experience of the service, and those choices are important, but what really sets the tone for us, what really makes all the difference in the world, are the words of the Book of Common Prayer.  It's really hard to mess up a funeral with the magnificent theological statement made by the liturgy. 

What seperates this liturgy from others is the emphasis on Easter.   Our hope, and the hope of all who die in the Lord, is the hope of the resurrection.  That's the reason why we celebrate individual saints' days on the day of their death rather than on the day they were born.  Our funeral day is also our Easter day, and when I read the words of the Burial Office, I try to read it the way I read the Easter liturgy.   I read it like I believe it, because I do. 

"All of us go down to the dust; yet even at the grave we make our song: Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia!"

(note: if you would like to see the liturgy mentioned in this post, go to www.bcponline.org, and click on "pastoral offices" and then "Burial of the Dead, Rite Two")