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A wedding and a funeral tomorrow


Brisketexan

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Not me, but my wife. She performs weddings all the time - hundreds under her belt. But tomorrow, she also has a funeral. She’s done a fair number of funerals, too. It’s part of her calling. But this is her first one for a baby.

She’s worked on the homily with me, the concepts and ideas she wants to communicate. She doesn’t usually do that; this one is hard. I have no idea what to say; the entire concept overwhelms me.

The whole process is more than I even want to imagine, yet I know that it’s all too real for one family. Fuck.

She’s gotta help say goodbye to a baby tomorrow. I don’t have any idea how you do that. I don’t know if anyone does.

Well, there that is. What a shitty week.

 

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Random thought about funerals for non-religious people.  Obviously many people don’t belong to churches/temples but when they die, the common step is for the surviving family to find a preacher, reverend, rabbi, whatever to lead the services.

 I find it odd when the person leading the funeral service states they never met the deceased.  They’re always respectful.  Gathers a few anecdotes about the deceased.  Very professional.  I get that it wouldn’t be  easy to ask a grieving friend or family member to emcee the service but is it better to ask a stranger?  

And how does the find-a-preacher thing work?  Is it contracted thru the funeral home for a couple hundred $ for a few hours of time?  

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I have a tremendous amount of respect for priests and pastors who serve at funerals. They must share a good bit of the sadness and grief suffered by the family and friends of the deceased, yet they have to be the rock of comfort for those folks. I could probably hold it together for a stranger or someone I knew casually, but for a friend or a child, I’d be a total wreck.

A ton of admiration for your wife’s ministry, Brisket.

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4 hours ago, Nice Guy Eddie said:

Random thought about funerals for non-religious people.  Obviously many people don’t belong to churches/temples but when they die, the common step is for the surviving family to find a preacher, reverend, rabbi, whatever to lead the services.

 I find it odd when the person leading the funeral service states they never met the deceased.  They’re always respectful.  Gathers a few anecdotes about the deceased.  Very professional.  I get that it wouldn’t be  easy to ask a grieving friend or family member to emcee the service but is it better to ask a stranger?  

And how does the find-a-preacher thing work?  Is it contracted thru the funeral home for a couple hundred $ for a few hours of time?  

That’s what we have to do when and if we need too. We don’t need to hire a preacher. I went to a funeral recently and the deceased cousin did an amazing job. Just being humble and making it a day for all the grieving kept him strong I think. The damn thing lasted three hours, just folks sharing their memories. It can be an incredibly powerful thing to drop your defenses and grieve as a family.

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Funerals are more for the living than the dead.

Definitely this.
Her approach was geared towards giving the living some instructions and thoughts on how to move forward, and how to support the family. How to help them remember their child, as they so fear that he’ll be forgotten.
And she said it was every bit as difficult as you can imagine.
No way could I do what she does.

Oh, and as for folks who don’t have a regular church, and how they plan, yes, sometimes the funeral home calls in a pastor cold. My wife has done that a few times - but she makes the effort to spend real time with the family before, to get to know them, and how they connected with the deceased. The other extreme is “Brother Hurley.”

Brother Hurley was an old, itinerant south Texas preacher. My south Texas grandfather knew that the tradition was, when you die, “you get Brother Hurley to come read over ya.” So, we did that. As we sat out in the dust and sun in Bigfoot, Texas, Brother Hurley went on about how my grandfather was a godly man who loved and lived for his savior (so, kinda the opposite of the decent, but beer-drinking, smoking, and cussing S Texas rancher that he was). He finished, and my mom stood up and said “well, and let me tell you how he really was....”. The crowd cracked up, and the stories rolled. So, there can definitely be an awkwardness in hiring a preacher “cold.”

For today’s family, they aren’t really religious, like many of their generation. But, also as is typical, they have faith and believe in something. My wife married them. And to them, she is their pastor, even if they aren’t churchgoing. When this happened, she is who they immediately reached out to. I’m glad they had her to connect with. But damn, I wish they hadn’t needed to.

And yeah, my wife is 10x the person that I could ever hope to be. I’m glad that there are people like her out there.
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I’ve been to a couple funerals where I don’t think the deceased was someone that would have wanted one but it was the family doing it because it’s what you do.   

Personally I could really care less about a service for me.  I won’t know what’s happening so it doesn’t make a difference for me one way or the other.

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I’ve been to a couple funerals where I don’t think the deceased was someone that would have wanted one but it was the family doing it because it’s what you do.   
Personally I could really care less about a service for me.  I won’t know what’s happening so it doesn’t make a difference for me one way or the other.

My old man is a sanguine old Mexican. One night at dinner, somehow the prospect of death and funerals came up. He said he didn’t give a shit what people do, because “once you’re dead, it doesn’t matter.” It has since become a humorous family saying.
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