SERMON PREACHED BY
THE REVEREND DR. HAROLD T. LEWIS, RECTOR
CALVARY EPISCOPAL CHURCH,
PITTSBURGH, PENNSYLVANIA
AT A SOLEMN REQUIEM EUCHARIST FOR ALL THE FAITHFUL DEPARTED
FRIDAY 5 NOVEMBER 2004

 
 
"Hope does not disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through
the Holy Spirit." (Romans 5:5)
 
One of the first letters I remember receiving after going away to college was from one of the curates
of my home parish, Father Alan McFarlane. "Father Mac" had been a mentor to me, and was very
instrumental in helping me discern my vocation to the priesthood. The details of that letter have long
since faded from memory, except for one line. It simply said, "I visited your grandmother yesterday.
Can she live long?" I believe this was the first inkling I had that my grandmother was terminally ill.
There were at least three reasons for my woeful ignorance. First, the family was probably into denial ---
as was my grandmother herself, who ignored the early signs of breast cancer, and probably just accepted
her pain and discomfort as part of the cross she had to bear. Second, my family's roots are in the
Caribbean island of Barbados, which for many years was known as "Little England." And one of the
things we inherited from the English who taught and acculturated us was the British penchant for the
stiff upper lip, which made stoicism --- and avoiding unpleasant subjects --- a virtue. And finally, forty
years ago, in my family, as in many families, children were still very much seen and not heard. Matters
of consequence, such as life and death, were simply not topics to be discussed with a sixteen-year-old.
Father Mac probably knew all this, and this is why he gave me the heads-up, for which I was most
grateful. It softened the blow a few weeks later when my mother phoned to tell me that Grandma had
died, and that I should take the overnight train to New York the following evening.
 
Grandmother Edith's funeral was held in her parish church, St. Stephen's. The family --- her five living
children and their spouses, a dozen or so grandchildren and an assortment of other kin --- processed
into the church, mournfully walking behind the coffin, and sat down in the front pews reserved for them ---
and there they sat for the duration of the service. They sat for the Gospel, they sat for the Creed, they
sat for the Commendation. This custom grew out of a belief in those days --- at least in our culture ----
that those who were stricken with grief were also feeble of limb, and that in their bereavement they
should be dispensed from the requisite liturgical aerobics. I, however, did not sit. When we arrived
at the church, I reported to the sacristy, and asked the rector if I could serve the mass. And one of my
duties was to walk before the coffin as we entered and as we left the church. After the funeral, I placed
the ornate brass and mahogany processional cross in the hearse, alongside the coffin, and when we
arrived at the cemetery, I retrieved the cross and led the body to its final resting place, where my
grandfather Harold and a few other relatives were already interred.

Now, I don't think that the word "oxymoron" was in my vocabulary at the time, but had it been, I think
I would have used it to describe what I heard next. As the priest took a clump of earth and traced with
it the sign of the Cross on the coffin, he said: "Unto Almighty God we commend the soul of our sister
departed, and we commit her body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in sure and
certain hope of the Resurrection unto eternal life through our Lord Jesus Christ." To my young mind,
something didn't click. To me, hope, by definition, was anything but sure and certain. Hope was an
expression of something we would like to happen. We express a hope that it won't rain, so that we can
go on a picnic; we hope that the girl in our class will go with us to the prom; we hope that Mother has
made bread pudding for dessert. But there is nothing either sure or certain about those hopes. It might
rain torrents, canceling the picnic. Our would-be date may already be spoken for. And Mother might
serve us canned peaches because she didn't have time to make dessert.
 
But to the Christian, "sure and certain hope" is not an oxymoron at all. It is a statement of faith, based
not on our feeble wishes and desires, arising not from some vague sense of optimism, but on God's
own pledge and assurance. This is why Father Baring-Gould could write, in his stirring hymn, "We
have Christ's own promise, and that cannot fail."(*1) This is why St. Peter can write to those under
persecution: "God has given us new birth into a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from
the dead" (I Pet. 1:3). And this is why we can say with confidence at every mass for the dead: "Jesus
Christ, who rose victorious from the dead . . . comforts us with the blessed hope of everlasting life. For
to your faithful people, O Lord, life is changed, not ended, and when our mortal body lies in death, there
is prepared for us a dwelling place eternal in the heavens."(*2)
 
"Life is changed, not ended," we say. In other words, eternal life is not something that we look forward
to experiencing after we breathe our last. It is not synonymous with "heaven" or "afterlife." Eternal life
is what we experience from the womb to the tomb and beyond. As Christians, we believe that death
marks not an end, but a transition from one stage of eternal life to another, from the Church Militant to
the Church Triumphant. Our very presence here tonight speaks to our recognition of this transition.
To us, the faithful departed are dead, but they are not dead and gone. In the words of a majestic prayer,
they "rejoice with us, but upon another shore and in another light."(*3) What is more, they are working on
our behalf. This is why we can say of the departed, that "encouraged by their examples, aided by their
prayers, and strengthened by their fellowship, we may also be partakers of the inheritance of the saints
in light."(*4) Hymn writers for centuries have plumbed the depths of their imagination in an effort to
describe that place of peace, where every hope is fulfilled. Thus, Abelard could write: "O what their
joy and their glory must be, those endless Sabbaths the blessed ones see." (*5)
 
Now if indeed eternal life is a continuum, what does that tell us about how we should conduct ourselves
as Christians? First, it means that we must adopt the theology of Martha Willis. Mrs. Willis was one
of my parishioners at St. Monica's, Washington, who died last month at the age of 101. At a Lenten
house eucharist almost thirty years ago, the question of the deathbed penitent came up. Is it fair,
someone asked, for the Pearly Gates to be opened to someone who had been a happy heathen all his life,
when the same reward is offered to the faithful Christian who has led "a righteous, godly and sober life"?
Mrs. Willis, without batting an eyelash, said that the reward was not the same at all. The happy heathen,
she pointed out, never knew the joy of being a Christian. What this devout churchwoman was saying
is that Christianity is not a pie-in-the-sky-bye-and-bye religion. Good works are not the premiums for
some heavenly insurance policy. Our earthly life is not some vale of tears, a place to suffer before
reaching heaven. Our earthly life is an experience, as Jesus tells us, in which we should "have life,
and have it abundantly" (John 10:10).
 
Second, we must remember that we are all terminal. We are terminal from the moment that the doctor
slaps us on the buttocks. Although we use the word to describe the life of one whose death, like my
Grandmother Edith's, is presumed to be imminent, strictly speaking, it is just a synonym for "mortal,"
which means, simply, that one day, unlike the immortal God whom we worship, we will die. To suggest
that we should live every day as if it were our last is not morbid, it is realistic. Moreover, it is a piece of
spiritual advice that is driven home time and time again in Holy Scripture. "Watch, therefore," warns
Jesus, "for you do not know which day your Lord is coming" (Mt. 24:42). And this does not just mean
that we want to go to our Maker in what theologians have long described as "a state of grace," shriven
of our sins, and fortified by the sacraments. It also means leaving our affairs in order. A rubric in the
Prayer Book admonishes "all persons to make wills, while they are in health, arranging for the disposal
of their temporal goods, not neglecting, if they are able, to leave bequests for religious and charitable
uses."(*6)
 
Lastly, amidst the changes and chances of this mortal life, we must not lose hope. A few days ago, our
nation went to the polls and decided that the 43rd President should remain at 1600 Pennsylvania
Avenue for four more years. Before the election, commentators said that the American people lived through
the most bitter and divisive campaign in living memory. After the election, it was said (and would have
been said regardless of the outcome) that we live in a divided nation. There seem to be fundamental
differences among the American people about the basics --- issues of justice, moral values, war and peace.
And just as Americans espouse vastly different interpretations of the Bill of Rights, so do Christians in
our corner of the vineyard interpret the Church's Constitution in widely different ways. We are, even as
we offer up this solemn mass of requiem, in the midst of a diocesan convention, and sadly, the
divisiveness and enmity present in our nation are alive and well in the bosom of the church. To sit in the
councils of the church today must be not unlike attending gatherings of the church in ancient Corinth,
where Christians were divided on every conceivable issue, and moreover allied themselves behind their
favorite leaders --- some for Apollos, some for Cephas, some for Paul (I Cor. 1:10-17).
 
But the Blessed Apostle admonishes us to rejoice in our sufferings, "knowing that suffering produces
endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not
disappoint us, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit" (Romans
5:3-5). In the face of adversity, Paul exhorts us: "Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation, be
constant in prayer, contribute to the needs of the saints, practice hospitality" (Romans 12:12-13).
 
Doesn't this sound like Calvary's mantra? During the past hundred and fifty years, we have had our
tribulations. Lest we forget, our parish was founded over the objections of the bishop. Today we stand
fast, offering up true and laudable worship to Almighty God, contributing to the needs of the saints, and
practicing hospitality, even as our bishop, presuming to preside over something called a network, has
attempted to relegate us to a place somewhere beyond the borders of the community of faith. Tonight, as
we continue to give thanks unto Almighty God that he has seen fit to bless and preserve this parish for a
century and a half, we remember before God all his faithful servants who have built up the Kingdom in
this place, and especially the fourteen men of God whose successor I am privileged to be. They do indeed
"rejoice with us, but upon another shore and in another light," and we give thanks for their witness, even
as we build upon their foundation.
 
Let us pray:
Anoint them priests! Help them to intercede
With all thy royal priesthood born of grace;
Through them thy Church presents in word and deed
Christ's one true sacrifice with thankful praise.(*7)
 
+Rest eternal grant unto them, O Lord, and may light perpetual shine upon them. May their souls and
the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God, rest in peace. AMEN.
 
 
__________
1. Sabine Baring-Gould, "Onward, Christian Soldiers," The Hymnal 1982, 562.
2. Proper prefac, "Commemoration of the Dead," BCP, p. 382.
3. The Bidding Prayer, Service of the Nine Lessons and Carols
4. Additional Prayers, Burial of the Dead, BCP, p. 489
5. Abelard, :O Quanta Qualia,", The Hymnal 1982, 623.
6. Thanksgiving for a Child, BCP, p. 445. It is interesting to note that in the 1928 BCP, this rubric was found in the service for the Visitation of the Sick.
7. Carl O. Daw, v. 3, "God of the prophets," The Hymnal 1982, 359.