I’ll Sing on, I’ll Sing on —Thoughts on Funerals

After a busy week, from Cathedral Day and confirmations last Saturday, to Clergy Conference from Sunday night through Wednesday, a personal retreat day for reading and a friend’s celebration of New Ministry on Thursday, a quiet Friday, and a funeral today, I am back at home feeling introspective.

The funeral was for a colleague, a friend and deacon named Becky. Becky and I weren’t close, but she was a steady, kind, and quietly powerful presence in the background of my discernment process leading up toward ordination. I hadn’t even known she was sick when I got the news of her death. I read the email with a little gasp, and promptly rearranged a few things in my calendar so I could attend.

I had this errant thought, even as I used one of the strategically placed tissues to tend to my tears: I love funerals.

Is this a strange thing to confess? Possibly. But a funeral done well can be incredibly cathartic to all those left behind to grieve. Whether the decedent had lived a long life, like Becky, or had died tragically young, like my forever 24 year old friend Lee, funerals can honor the one who died while also giving space for whole range of emotions that all of us left behind may feel. And as an Episcopalian, I am a bit biased into thinking we do them especially well. There is room for tears, room for laughter, room for stories, room for beauty, and almost certainly there will be some yummy food afterwards. Perhaps most importantly, there will be a defiant rejection of the finality of death, a declaration that though Becky doesn’t walk the earth with us any longer, she has not ceased to exist—love and life forever ground death into the dust, even as we return to it at the end of our lives.

This got me thinking about my own funeral. Now, I’m only thirty-eight, so I hope said funeral is many, many years away. Still, after years as a critical care chaplain and my new role as a volunteer fire department chaplain, I know better than most that life can change in a single moment— an accident, a diagnosis, a sudden health crisis, an impulsive and irreversible choice— all these can end our lives as we know them with little to no advanced notice. So I have already planned my funeral! And you know what, friends, I planned a SAD one! Because if the service as it is currently written has to be used, then I will have died suddenly and tragically, so you know what, people should be sad, and the worship service should make room for them to feel and express that sadness!

I have sat through funerals for children or teens or young adults that did not make room for sadness, even in the midst of tragedy. That may work for some people, and I do not begrudge them their comfort. But it sure didn’t work for me. So with that in mind, I picked music and scripture readings that would hopefully allow people to celebrate my life and cling to the hope of resurrection without forcing them to ignore the weight of their grief.

It’s hard to explain to my congregation sometimes why I enjoy sitting down with them to plan their funerals. It’s not because I look forward to burying them (indeed, I rarely make it through funerals without crying, even if I am the officiant), but because I enjoy creating a liturgical experience that honors their life and will give meaning and catharsis to their loved ones.

Becky’s funeral was a great example of all of this. There was comfort in togetherness. The church was packed. We cried as the scriptures were read, then we laughed and cried as Becky’s adult children told stories about her. The preacher defiantly declared that Becky’s life continued on beyond our sight. We shared communion and we sang. Most of the songs were familiar and comforting, with a gentle tone, but the last one, “What Wondrous Love is This,” is often sung during Lent or Holy Week, and it has a more somber tone.

1 What wondrous love is this, O my soul, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this, O my soul!
What wondrous love is this, that caused the Lord of bliss
to bear the dreadful curse for my soul, for my soul,
to bear the dreadful curse for my soul.

2 To God and to the Lamb I will sing, I will sing;
to God and to the Lamb, I will sing.
To God and to the Lamb who is the great "I AM,"
while millions join the theme, I will sing, I will sing,
while millions join the theme, I will sing.

3 And when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on,
and when from death I’m free, I’ll sing on.
And when from death I’m free I’ll sing and joyful be,
and through eternity I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on,
and through eternity I’ll sing on.

I left the service feeling comforted and hopeful— the sadness of not having Becky among us at clergy gatherings will remain for some time, a pale shadow of the grief her beloved family is feeling, yes, but the funeral itself tells the story not only of Becky’s life but of all life the way we Christians understand it: we sing on.

All to say, my dear friends: plan your funerals! You can always change the songs or the tone as your circumstances change; a 94 year old’s funeral can and should feel different from a 24 year old’s funeral or, God forbid, a 14 or 4 year old’s funeral. You aren’t setting it in stone, but rather, giving your family the gift one one less decision to make, one less event to plan. They will know your wishes from the beginning. And hopefully, by the end of your service, they will have been assured that indeed, you sing on.