Were you ever the kid who tried to do your book report without reading the book? Now imagine you’re a priest and you’re asked to speak at the funeral of a woman you’d only met a few times. Same result. Lots of stuttering, few relevant details.
Yes, my grandmother’s funeral was hilarious. Thank you for asking.
In addition to dying just a week before my cousin’s wedding, apparently she also died on or near the feast day for some St. Attracta, which the priest found somehow amazing. Any time you start a speech with “Isabel would have loved to have died this week” because you don’t know it’s week of her grandson’s wedding, you’re bound to have near riot conditions on your hands.
At no point did he tell us why Gram would have loved St. Attracta, but he was so certain he saw a parallel with them that I was sure I’d missed a family joke somewhere.
Before it just devolved into him just jibbering away, he certainly hammered out the semantics of their respective names.
Here’s the highlight:
“So you have Isabel. Let’s break that down: Isabel Is. A. Belle. If we look at the translation, then we see: Is. A. Beauty. Add that to St. Attracta’s feast day and we have a beauty who is attractive.” (At this point my brother leans over and whispers to me, “Is he hitting on her? That’s my grandmother, you sick son of a bitch.”)
It went on like this for some time, with the priest just going back and forth repeating “Isabel, Attracta, Isabel, Attracta” in front of dumbfounded mourners.
My uncle later said he was worried the next step was for him to command the right side to shout “Isabel!” and the right side shout “Attracta!”
Having gotten that out of his system, he retired to his seat on the altar to let us all contemplate the wisdom of God.
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1 comment:
I unfortunately know exactly how you felt. When my grandfather died, his funeral service was presented by the local Catholic priest, who I'm quite sure had never met my grandfather. My cousins and I were flabbergasted both initially by the priest's inability to pronounce our family name, (which is quite difficult, but well known within the community and especially that parish) and continually by the absolute lies he read verbatim from his prepared comments.
Shortly after the beginning of the service, I was inclined to stand up and denounce the speaker for his blasphemy. By the end, I was so enraged that I couldn't even share my father's sorrow.
I have been to beautiful and touching, however difficult and unfortunate, funeral services. The celebration of life and the retrospect of its value is rarely so deeply shared. I was raised Protestant, (which, according to Benedict may not even be a church, however I'll spare my feelings on that)and my grandfather's funeral was my first real exposure to catholicism. I harbor no ill feelings about it today, though I know that the thoughtless script used that day left many of us feeling empty...
I've re-written this ending 4 times now, and I don't know where to go from here.
Suffice it to say that God is love, and there was no love coming from the priest that day.
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