Mary Kathleen Dove RIP

Funeral Homily for Mary Dove, 1936-2021, St Joseph’s, Rustington.

Where is Mary Dove? Her body is here, but dare we hope that her spirit lives on beyond the memories we treasure in our hearts?

On a day like today, we gather to honour someone we have loved and lost. We gather in our diversity of beliefs. We may believe that there is an afterlife, or that there isn’t. We may or may not believe that the actions of the living can help those who have passed to make their final journey. Our first reading, from the Book of Daniel, recalls his belief – hundreds of years before the time of Jesus – that a day will come when all who died will be raised to eternal life by the God of Abraham. Each of us is entitled to our own belief – but I am here to honour what Mary Dove believed, and she was a Catholic, of Catholic stock.

Mary’s maiden name was Arrowsmith, and there are Arrowsmiths here today. Perhaps the most famous bearer of that name was St Edmund Arrowsmith, a priest who ministered in Lancashire in the 17th Century, when Catholicism was outlawed in England, and who paid with his life for what he believed.

St Edmund often did, in hiding, what I am about to do today. He celebrated the Mass, the Christian Eucharist, the re-presenting of what Jesus Christ did at the last supper. The night before Jesus was taken and executed, he shared a final meal with his friends. He took bread and wine, and declared them to be his own body and blood. He commanded his followers to “do this, take and eat” in his memory.

From the earliest days of the Christian church, followers of Jesus believed that a particular celebration of Mass could dedicated as a prayer to help the final journey of someone who had died. This is why a normal part of a Catholic funeral is to celebrate the Last Supper. And it was at that supper that Jesus spoke the words we have just heard read aloud: “There are many rooms in my Father’s house. I am going now to prepare a place for you.”

Words of hope. Words of comfort. The very words we want to hear when our hearts are aching for someone we have loved and lost. But dare we hope that they are true in the most fundamental way? The Christian faith holds that three days after this meal, Jesus Christ appeared, risen from the dead, after having been tortured and executed on the cross. If Jesus really did return from the dead, we have every reason to hope that his promise is true, that he has prepared a room in heaven not only for Mary but for each one of us – and that it is the most meaningful thing in the world to follow his instructions and celebrate this Supper anew.

We also read that on that night, Christ said: “Do not let your hearts be troubled.” Our hearts are troubled, because Mary was suddenly taken from our midst, and are only a little consoled that we had a few days to say our goodbyes. But Mary believed there was reason to hope in a life beyond this life, in a God who can wipe away every tear and gladden our hearts even in times of sorrow. If you dare to trust in the God whom Mary trusted, in that silent place where you think your private thoughts, share your saddened heart with God and ask for a share of the gladness which only God can give.

The word Eucharist – the technical name for the Last Supper – comes from the Greek word for “thank you”. Jesus took bread and wine and gave thanks to God, whom he called Father. His last free act on earth was an act of thanksgiving.

After her unexpected fall, Mary Dove lived for a few more days but was only able to speak briefly. Among her last words were one sentence – “goodbye and thank you”. To whom was Mary giving thanks? To those who had gathered around her bed to show their love, for sure – but perhaps also to God. At any rate, like Christ’s, her last voluntary act on earth was an act of thanksgiving. And the word “goodbye”, such a common word in our everyday speech, has a deeper meaning – for it is nothing less than a shortening of “God be with you – God b’with ye – Goodbye.”

From our side of the veil between heaven and earth, we can echo those last words, goodbye and thank you, Mary Dove. We might dare to hope that on the other side, she is hearing the voice of Christ, “Hello and thank you Mary Dove, thank you for your love and service as a wife, as a mother, as a nurse, as a person who cared. Enter into eternal life.” So thank you Mary Dove, rest in peace, and God be with you until we meet again.

Coach Class

Homily for the 28th Sunday of Ordinary Time, Year B, for participants in the Beginning Experience residential weekend at SENT, 10 October 2021.

Emma Raducanu is looking for a new coach.

She’s young. She’s successful! But she’s also vulnerable, and she knows she can’t make it on her own.

At Wimbledon, she beat three world class players and then withdrew due to personal difficulties. At New York, she won the tournament! Then at Indian Wells, she was knocked out in the first round.

Have you ever known you’ve needed to be challenged beyond your comfort zone?

Great athletes know they need coaches. Without a coach to hold them to their disciplines, they might not get up so early or so often to train in the early morning, nor keep going until they’ve exceeded their personal best.

The young man in today’s Gospel knew he needed spiritual coaching. He was already a spiritual athlete, in the premier league of those who kept God’s Law. But he sensed he was called to more. Jesus threw down a challenge, to step out of his comfort zone and place his total trust in God. On this day, he wasn’t ready… and the Bible doesn’t show us what he did later, so we can only imagine whether his was a story of eternal regret or eventual surrender.

Like Emma Raducanu, each one of us faces three possibilities in our life with God. We can withdraw – that is, not take God’s law seriously at all. But in that case, you wouldn’t be here on a weekend like this. So we set out on the journey with Jesus, trying to keep God’s law – sometimes succeeding, sometimes failing.

It’s the job of a coach to encourage success – but also to help us move forward after failure.

Sometimes a coach has to help us unlearn bad habits we have picked up along the way.

Sometimes a coach has to help us unlearn even good habits we have picked up along the way, which might have helped us at the time but are now stopping us from moving forwards to where we need to be.

Holiness often requires “letting go”.

Perhaps we’ve been blessed with a long and happy marriage, but the one we love has died. I know a man, a friend of my family, who lost his wife but was so broken he couldn’t let a day go by without visiting her grave. We do well to honour the one who loved us in the past, but God invites us to be free in the present.

Perhaps we’ve suffered the failure of a marriage, and we feel shamed by the demands of the Catholic Church. Well-meaning Catholics sometimes misunderstand what the Church asks, and become bad coaches pushing us in wrong directions. So I want you to hear this from the lips of a priest in the pulpit: There is no shame in walking away from an unsafe relationship where your partner refuses to take your needs seriously. There is no shame in obtaining a legal divorce when you’ve tried your best to make the relationship work and you need to manage the financial reality of being separate. And there is no shame in asking the question, “Was my marriage a binding covenant made by both of us in the way required to create a sacred and lifelong bond?” – which is the question the Catholic Church’s tribunals ask when considering an annulment.

We are all pilgrims on the journey of holiness. Today’s Gospel opens with the words “Jesus was setting out on a journey.” Indeed, the whole of Mark’s Gospel is a journey to Jerusalem, filled with news about the things Jesus did “on the way”. The journey of life includes many beginnings, and today we start anew – if we are willing to start at all. For the young man in today’s Gospel, his possessions were holding him back. Jesus recognised that for others, it might be attachment to land or family relationships. He asks, “Will you let go, and come and follow me?”

How can we let go? Nothing is impossible to God. The Word of God has the power to cut the strongest bonds and enlighten the darkest places.

Forgiveness is a decision. It starts with saying the words “I forgive you.” If you can’t do that on your own, use the mighty power of God. “In Jesus Name, I forgive you.” Note what you are NOT saying. You’re not saying “I excuse you.” You’re not saying “That’s OK.” You are only saying, “I choose not to punish you for the hurt you have done to me.”

Letting go is also a decision. Our parents, our husbands, our wives, our children – each are given to us for a season, but ultimately they belong to God. If we are acutely aware of the absence of a loved one, we might try this prayer, which comes from St Ignatius, founder of the Jesuit Order:

Take Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will, all that I have and possess. Thou hast given all to me. To Thee, O lord, I return it. All is Thine, dispose of it wholly according to Thy will. Give me Thy love and thy grace, for this is sufficient for me.

St Ignatius of Loyola

No-one looks for a coach who will give them an easy ride; a coach who doesn’t push you will never make you a winner. Emma Raducanu is still looking for a new coach. The rich young man found Jesus, but wasn’t ready to accept the challenge. There is no hiding place in Jesus for he is the Word of God who uncovers secret thoughts, and knows our innermost guilt and shame. He is the Wisdom of God, whom you are seeking. Taking Jesus as your coach will be painful, but rewarding. You will experience tough challenges and extraordinary blessings. You will discover new relationships, with God and with other members of the Church as your family. If you are willing to begin again, say yes to Jesus, whatever challenges you fear he will place before you. He is the one you are looking for, and he is Good, for he is God-with-us. Jesus, I trust in you.

Not Dead To Me

Reflection to participants in the Beginning Experience residential weekend at SENT, 9 October 2021, following the reading of the Prodigal Son.

You’re dead to me!

There’s a young man who wishes things could be different. He’s not at home in his Fathers house; he wants his inheritance now. In effect, he tells his Father “You’re dead to me!” And leaves his Father’s house to make his own way in the world.

Well, be careful what you wish for! He experiences a few of the pleasures which the world has to offer, but soon finds himself on Skid Row.

He recognises that his Father’s house is a place of provision, a place of plenty, and a place of protection. But it is a place for him? How will he be received in a few days if he shows his face once again at the door? He believes he has already forfeited the right to be there. Maybe if he grovels, he can at least be welcomed as a lowly servant?

What is in that young man’s mind as he ponders the path home to the Father’s house? What guilt is he feeling about the choice he made, the terrible choice to wish his Father dead? But more than – what shame he is sensing about who he is as a person, that he could even think of doing that in the first place?

Each of us battles with two great foes, called guilt and shame. Guilt is the knowledge that we have taken a wrong turn, knowing it was a bad way to go. The antidote to guilt is recognising what we’ve done, turning back, and saying sorry. But often we think we’re feeling guilt when our true enemy is shame. Deep down, doesn’t each and every one of us wish that what we are better than we truly are? But I’m not. I’m just me, with all my faults and flaws and weaknesses and embarrassments.

God our Father knows this. Jesus knows this. And they still love us – because their love for us does not depend on our perfection, but on their Goodness.

This can be hard for us to trust.

In science, if someone claims they found a way of generating energy which is too cheap to meter and causes no pollution, you would be right to be sceptical. In economics, if someone offers you a deal that sounds too good to be true, it probably is. And yet in our Christian faith we tell the story of a Father who loves and forgives and asks no questions other than, “Will you trust me?” and a Son who says: “Change your life, come to me, and all your sins can be forgiven.”

This is the greatness of the Father’s heart. Tonight the Father declares: “Let me put a ring on your finger, and sandals on your feet! Let’s have a feast! It’s party time, because the child I love has come home.”

Now I know what you’re thinking. “God loves me? Really me? That person?”

Yes.

This is why Jesus told the story of the straying son and his forgiving Father.

Your sins can be forgiven. For the guilt of your actions, all you have to do is say sorry, and do your very best to take a different and better path next time you’re faced with a similar decision. As for the shame of who you are, maybe there are things you don’t like about yourself but the Father loves you. Maybe you have weaknesses that trip you up time and time again, and the Father still says:

I love you. You exist because I created you out of love. You may wish to live in a world free of pain, free of conflict, free of trouble, but the only world I have to offer you is the one in which you live, the world in which you bind up one another’s wounds and bear each other’s burdens. I sent my own Son as a man among  you, and he was not exempt from the daily burden of human work. When the time was right, he opened his arms wide on the cross as a sign of his love, and mine, for each and every one of you. It may be hard to grasp how it works, but those open arms on the cross opened up the gates of heaven. Now you may enter in and all the blessings of heaven flow out through him. But no one is going to force you to enter. It is up to you to choose to take the road to the Father’s house. If you come to me I will run to meet you, I will put a ring on your finger, and wrap my cloak around you. All guilt can be forgiven, as long as you sincerely choose to seek another path. As for your shame, I cannot change your feelings overnight, but know that I know your heart better than you do yourself, and I love you and I want you to dwell in my house forever. Because I love you, I have placed the power of my Son into all of my priests, so that they can look into your eyes and declare, “Your sins are forgiven, and you are loved by your Father.”

However you feel, whatever you’ve done, “Today you are alive to me,” says the Father. Choose life, and you shall live!