Funerals
Plannning a Funeral
Planning a funeral can be a difficult and emotional time for family and friends alike.
The process is often unfamiliar or overwhelming as many of us do not have to plan many funerals in our lifetimes. If you haven’t already, please get in touch with the Parish Office to make an appointment with the Parish Priest - Fr. Bernard - to discuss any plans and arrangements for a funeral.
No date should be set until this meeting has happened. Fr. Bernard will be able to talk you through the various options and answer any questions you may have.
Practical Things You Will Need To Do
Contact your chosen Funeral Director who will liaise with you and the Parish concerning the funeral.
You will want to decide whether you want a Requiem Mass or a Funeral service - the Parish Priest will help you with this.
The Funeral Director will contact the Parish to arrange the day and time of the funeral, which will be dependent on the availability of the Priests and Churches, as well as the availability of the Funeral Directors themselves and the cemetery/crematorium staff.
The family will need to consider the following:
Do you want to have a Vigil in Church with the coffin staying overnight before day of the funeral?
Do you want a burial or cremation? If it is a cremation, remember it must not be because you do not believe in the Resurrection; this is why the Priest will ask you to decide where you wish the ashes to be buried – they cannot be scattered! Nor can the ashes be divided, with some buried in one place, and some in another.
Decide if you want a Reception after the funeral and if you do where do you want it? The Reception is important because that is where you can either by a display or by a computer, you give a bio-epic of your loved one’s life through photos.
Graves
If you bury either the body or the ashes in one of our four cemeteries [New Bradwell, Wolverton, Calverton Road or London Road] then remember to come along in November on a Saturday at 12 noon and be with us as we bless the graves and pray for the dead.
Wills
If you are making a Will for your own demise, make sure you put aside a donation for Masses to be said on your behalf, as not all families remember to have Masses offered for their dead.
Check whether or not the Will your loved has made has put any declarations about the funeral: eg Masses to be offered; or whether it is to be a burial or a cremation.
In our own Wills, Catholics are obligated to tithe a part of the estate for the Parish; this is both a thanksgiving for the Parish’s care of your spiritual life but also a gift for the Parish’s continuation in the future.
Make sure the following know what you have arranged with the Priest for your funeral: Executors of the Will; Funeral directors; & Family.
What We Believe About Death
When the Lord calls your loved one from this world into the next, there are certain things we need to keep in mind; things that touch upon the truths of the Catholic Faith and things that are traditional and practical.
Every human being who is called from this world into the next stands before the judgment seat of the Lord God to give an account of the life that God has given them as their Creator and blessed them as their Redeemer:
“For all of us must appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive recompense for what has been done in the body, whether good or evil” [2 Cor 5:10]
It is for this reason that the Church calls us to offer up prayers and sacrifices for the souls of the dead.
Whether it is a Requiem Mass or a Funeral Service this occasion is not about celebrating a person’s life, it is about these three things:
First, to offer up our prayers, our funeral service or the Requiem Mass for the soul of the person who now needs our help before the judgment seat of God.
Secondly, we listen to the Word of God Who speaks to us about the hope for a loved one, even in death, promised by Our Lord Jesus to the grieving who rose from the dead: “Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted” [Matt 5:4]
Thirdly, we give thanks to the Lord for the graces that were bestowed upon our loved one by which we came to know and love them and now sorely miss them. This is called the Farewell Address. This is not a Eulogy as only God knows the true worth and value of the Soul before him.
A Word About Grief
When we lose someone whom we have loved in death, our hearts are broken. But in the fire of a broken heart, many questions arise but there are three questions that come to the surface which seem to be universal.
They are universal because all those who mourn throughout the world ask these fundamental questions. A Catholic funeral addresses the 3 questions asked about a loved one. Be that loved one a parent, a sibling, a child, a grandparent, an uncle or aunt, cousin or friend:
Where is our loved one?
Is our loved one alright?
Will I ever see my loved one again?
“But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about those who have died, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. For since we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so, through Jesus, God will bring with him those who have died. For this we declare to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will by no means precede those who have died.
For the Lord himself, with a cry of command, with the archangel’s call and with the sound of God’s trumpet, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up in the clouds together with them to meet the Lord in the air; and so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage one another with these words.”
[1 Thess 4:13-18]