3 Life-Changing Questions to Guide Your New Year
I recently participated in the funeral choir at my parish for a lady in our choir whose mother passed away. I have only been to a handful of funerals in my life, and it had probably been 7 or 8 years since my last one, which was my grandfather’s.
For some reason, I felt like I was called to be there that day.
Sure enough, this funeral touched me in a special way. Not only was it a blessing to sing and honor a faithful woman and support our fellow choir member -- a dear, lovely woman -- but it taught me a lesson of how to live as such a woman.
This woman had a chronic disease for many years of her life, as do I. The readings and homily echoed this woman’s spirit of perseverence and determination; warmth, care and love for those around her -- namely her family and friends; her sense of being alive -- using her gifts and what she had to serve others; and letting her faith touch and heal her.
Any time I’ve encountered death at funerals, in graveyards, or pondering the death of loved ones in my own life, I am taught something about living.
The faithful people who pass on to eternal life teach us how to live.
May we, the living faithful, learn from them.