At the Grave Side

I've come to the cemetery for a funeral this morning; now, after having just concluded a grave-side service, I'm sitting in a wonderfully warmed car. It's freezing cold out there and a gentle snow is falling.

From the warmth of my present situation, I am reflecting on life and death. Earlier, when we were slowly driving in procession to the grave site, I was, and even now am, keenly aware of the many familiar surnames that are emblazoned on the head stones here: Dougherty, Johnson, Winterling, Rivera, Miller, Newton, Kowalski, Duffy, Benz, Lang, Santos, Schmidt, Hunt, and so many others. People I have known have held these names.

And the names on these stones, memorials to real people from so many families, remind me of so many others who have also departed from this life and who have gone on to the next. I have known some who were very young when they died, and others who had lived very long lives, but every one of them were human beings who were greatly loved and therefore were so very mournfully lost!

And yet, somehow I still have hope. Although death seems so final, I know that love never ends.

O Lord, grant that our sisters and brothers may sleep here in peace until you awaken them to glory, for you are the resurrection and the life. Amen. Praise God!  Friar Timothy

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