Liturgies

I want to talk about today are those personal memorials that we create for our loved ones and to honour those whose photos we have brought here today.

 

I recently visited Australia Zoo and toured the Hospital there that cares for thousands of injured and sick animals and birds, founded by Steve Irwin. He built this hospital in dedication to his Mum. Engraved on the glass wall of the building was an inscription. It read, “She was the greatest wildlife rehabilitator in the world, a true pioneer. She was a legend and in my heart she will live forever”.

 

What struck me was that the memory of his Mother lived in his HEART. And that’s where our memories of our loved ones are – in our HEARTS. That’s where they begin and that’s where they stay. We link with each other’s hearts today in our grief, our loss, our loneliness, and today we join in the remembrance and celebration of our loved ones.

 

There are tangible ways in which we can build on the memories of our loved ones, in acts of love – the photos you have brought here today, the plaques whose words we place very thoughtfully on gravestones, the places where we spread the ashes of our loved ones, the importance we place on their  STORIES and many other gestures of ways in which we can honour our loved ones..

 

What do these memorials do for our loved ones and for us? They are ways in which they can be remembered for years to come and take their memories to the future. They bring honour to our loved ones. I like the saying that goes, “I am honourable when I find my honour is to honour others”. Memorials can be a great help for us to cope with the loss of a loved one, in our grief. They can inspire us with the great qualities of a loved one. In this way they are a gift and an inspiration to us now. It is often our loved ones who bring comfort to us through the miracle of memorials.

 

I would like to share on a very personal note some ways in which I have created memorials for my late husband, John Roberts, who died just 2 years ago. I have built on his interests and hobbies of which he had many

 

John was an ardent photographer and video producer. He spent 2 years making a video of the Tower Bridge in London, and was determined to get it in for the best video of the year in his movie club. Four months before he died he won the competition. I have created the John Roberts annual memorial prize for the best video of the year.

 

John was a Doctor and played string bass in the Queensland Medical Orchestra, and at St Marys. They played a concert dedicated to John and other Doctors who have died of cancer. The concert was a fund raiser for Karuna palliative care agency and I spoke from the stage at that Concert about the wonderful care of John by Karuna.

These are some of the ways in which my family and myself have built on our memories of John.

 

You will have your ways of remembering your loved ones in your HEART, and in the memorials you create for them.

How does our Christian faith help us in the remembrance of our loved ones?

In our second reading today we see the woman who has anointed Jesus with costly oil for his burial. She is being affirmed by JESUS for her listening and service to Him rather than doing other acts of charity at this point in time. And then Jesus proclaims that this story of the act of service to Him will be told and remembered wherever the Good News of the Gospel is told. Here we see the importance of stories. It speaks to me of the importance of recording the stories of our loved ones.

 

At the heart of our liturgy is Eucharist or  Holy Communion, and we will enact a fellowship meal by eating bread and drinking wine, a symbolic act in remembrance of Jesus’ words which he spoke to His disciples at the last meal He shared with them. “Do this in memory of me”. This is a special time of remembrance of Jesus and we will also do this in remembrance of those loved ones who we honour today.

I would like to conclude with these words from the Dalai Lama:

THE WATERFALL

Our journey is like a mighty waterfall, said Zen Master. At the top of the waterfall and the bottom, there is the river. It is the same river, the same water. But as the river cascades over the edge and downwards, it does not fall as a single body of water. It separates into countless streams and tiny droplets. Transformed into separate currents, there is great turbulence. The water seems to boil and there is the constant roaring sound of the waterfall. It is as if the water can no longer move effortlessly when it is broken apart and it experiences confusion and turmoil as it falls.

 

In the same way, said the master, before birth and after death we are like the water of the flowing river. It is only after birth that we experience this sense of separateness, of difficulty and all our feelings. Not realizing that we are still one with the river, we have great fear.

 

But at the bottom of the waterfall, at the end of its journey, the turbulent water returns to its original oneness with the river and continues its inexorable movement to the sea.

 

“How very glad the water must be to return to the original river,” he said. “If this is so, what feeling will we have when we die?” We will have perfect composure then, perfect composure.”