Homily delivered by The Rev. Dr. Harold T. Lewis

HOMILY DELIVERED BY THE REVEREND DR. HAROLD T. LEWIS, RECTOR CALVARY EPISCOPAL CHURCH, PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA AT THE REQUIEM MASS FOR CECILIA ESTES KRUGER FULTON FRIDAY 23 FEBRUARY 2007



"Let not your hearts be troubled." (John 14:1)


Some people are aptly named. So it is with our beloved sister in Christ whom we commit to God's eternal care this morning. The biographies of Saint Cecilia, who was martyred in 117 A.D., describe her as "patrician" and cultivated." Cecilia Kruger Fulton was both. There was an air of refinement that was ever present in her bearing and speech. It was not, mind you, off-putting. It did not serve to distance those who came into contact with her; rather it commanded their respect, even their awe. Cecilia was well read. The lines of the great poets were never far from her lips, and she not infrequently invoked their thoughts, with the effect that she raised the bar of any conversation in which she was participating.

But Cecilia's Christian name is especially appropriate because like her sainted namesake, she had a love of music. It is said that at her wedding, St. Cecilia, who would later become the patron saint of church music, while listening to the profane music being offered by the instrumentalists who were hired for the occasion, "was singing in her heart to God alone." In this regard, our Cecilia outdid her namesake, because at her wedding to Robert Fulton in this church fourteen months ago, not a note of profane music was heard. Every piece of sacred music was chosen by the bride. Even before St. Augustine coined the phrase, St. Cecilia could say, "Quis cantat bis orat" ("he or she who sings prays twice.") It was such an approach to music that informed our Cecilia's participation in Calvary's choir.

We are gathered together today to celebrate the life of this elegant, cultured woman, who possessed a deep faith. A child of the manse, that faith was nurtured by her father, a priest of the church. We live in an age in which the Psalmist's "threescore years and ten" has become a short life, so that we can even say that Cecilia's death, a year short of fourscore years, seemed untimely, especially since it could be said that she and Rob were still in the honeymoon stage of their marriage.

The love affair between Rob and Cecilia is a story for which we would be wise to obtain the movie rights. Their first encounter was an aquatic one, where they were participating in an exercise class in the pool at Club One. Thus Mark Spitz and Esther Williams took notice of each other. They both attended Calvary Church, but in those days were not usually ensconced in the same pew, since Cecilia was singing in the choir. Then calamity struck. Cecilia was hit by a bus, and experienced a long and painful recuperation which, incidentally, she bore with remarkable patience and grace. By the luck of the draw, Rob was on the flower-delivery team, and Cecilia was his first delivery that Sunday afternoon after Cecilia's accident. Suffice it to say that it wasn't long after that that he began to bring flowers of his own, and the rest is history!

A month ago, I was present at a banquet at which Rob introduced his bride, saying how fortunate he was to have found a loving partner during his advanced years. That love was manifested by Rob even at the very end of Cecilia's life, when, in ICU, Rob talked to her, comforted her and even played music for her --- and rest assured, it was nothing profane!

To Rob, and to Cecilia's brothers Joel and Richard, and to all who mourn her loss, Jesus says, "Let not your hearts be troubled." It is not our responsibility to determine whose life is short and whose long, or whose relationships were prematurely cut short. All of these months and years pale before the eternity, those "endless Sabbaths" which Cecilia is now enjoying. In today's Gospel, Thomas, never the sharpest pencil in the apostolic box, asks Jesus, ""We know not wither thou goest; and how can we know the way?" Cecilia, however, steeped in the faith, knew exactly where she was going, and took Jesus at his word when he said "I am the way, the truth and the life."

Cecilia is now enjoying one of those "many mansions" prepared for her, and while we cannot know the floor plan of her newly inhabited celestial dwelling, we can rest assured there is an organ in the sitting room, and perhaps a library of CDs of the world's best church music which has obtained heavenly approval. And we can also be certain that her namesake, St. Cecilia, (by that time the other St. Cecilia) will visit occasionally, and perhaps will sing a duet: Here is the throne of David; And here, from care released, The shout of us who triumph, The song of us that feast; And we who with our Leader Have conquered in the fight, For ever and for ever Are clad in robes of white.

+Rest eternal grant unto Cecilia, O Lord, and may light perpetual shine upon her. May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. AMEN.