Book of Remembrance
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Please Remember in Your Prayers
the Deceased Parishioners of St. Anthony of Padua Parish
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(June)
George
Sherwood, Veronica Tomei,
Mary
Simmonds, Anne Searle,
Mary
McDonnell, William Murphy,
Ellen
Gray, Patrick Corcoran,
Dominic
Mannion, Molly Joseph,
Mary
Bryans, Norah Parker,
John Casey, Mark Cranston,
Wanda Peler, Timothy
Healy,
John Barry, Michael
McGirr,
Herbert Aitken, Peter
Robert Baylis,
Clara Crowley, Patrick
Remmion,
Catherine O’Grady, John
Byrne,
Walter Goy, John Donohoe,
John
Cumming, Denis Plummer,
James
Corcoran, Josie Morris,
Bernard
Callen, Mary Coward,
James Owens, Josephine Elsey
Paddy
Donohoe,Phyllis Higman,
Daniel
Scully, James Keane,
Jack Sharpe, Patrick
Murphy,
Sr. Anne, Marguritte
Therese Ignatitus,
William
O’Driscoll, Kathleen Savage,
Sarah Janine McElroy, Martin O’Grady,
Elizabeth
Chambers, John Burke,
William
Sparrow, Roger Langford,
Niorah Carroll, George Edwards,
June
Heather Mary Dique,
Maureen
Barron, Leo Monteiro,
Baby
Allanah Ryan, Coral Agnes Ennis,
Sammy Kennedy, Michael Gilmore,
Anna
Jaczniakowska, Ada
Ward,
Kitty Hayes, Michael Rabbitte,
Isabel
Noronha, Baby Simona Kaminskaite,
George Loader, Babies Fernando and Georgia
Pelegrin,
May they rest in peace
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How happy
are you the poor in spirit: Theirs is the
kingdom of heaven.
Happy are
the gentle: They shall have the earth for
their heritage.
Happy those
who mourn: They shall be comforted.
Happy those
who hunger for what is right: They shall be
satisfied.
Happy the
merciful: They shall have mercy shown them.
Happy
the pure in heart: They shall
see God.
Happy
the peacemakers: They shall
be called sons of God.
Happy
those who are persecuted in the cause of the right:
Theirs
is the kingdom of heaven.
Happy
are you when people abuse you and persecute you
and speak all kinds of calumny
against you on my account:
Rejoice
and be glad, you reward will be great in
heaven.
(Matthew
5: 1-12)
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Look to the Living
Death is the end, they said
No future
Just a barren, bleak, blackened landscape
Dead leaves under you feet
Dead hope in your heart
Cold, empty stillness all around me
No sound, no sign of life
Death is the end
The mocking voice rang in my ears.
So why do I go on searching
Looking for life?
Can it be that there is life
Hidden in death?
Can it be that beneath the hard cold ground
Newness struggles for breath?
Look for the living
A new voice - demanding, insisting
Blank unseeing eyes
Look around again at the winter landscape
The beeches, bare and cold
The grey clouds blotting out the sun
And at my feet the dry brown leaves
Poignant reminders of life that used to be.
Look for the living
Look again.
A pale green mist shimmers
On the inhospitable hedges
And there, and there again
A sharp green shoot
A frail white flower
Tender, delicate in its beauty
Almost hidden by dead leaves
The promise of hope
Tiny but true.
And there among the grass
A carpet of pale yellow appears Primroses
Here again in all their beauty
Reminding me of the resurrection
And new life
They are wrong!
Death is not the end
Look for the living.
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A LOVED ONE HAS DIED
"We give back to you, O God, those whom you gave to us. You did not lose them when you gave them to us, and we do not lose them by their return to you. Your dear Son has taught us that life is eternal and love cannot die. So death is only an horizon, and an horizon is only the limit of our sight. Open our eyes to see more clearly, and draw us closer to you that we may know that we are nearer to our loved ones, who are with you. You have told us that you are preparing a place for us: prepare us also for that happy place, that where you are we may also be always. O dear Lord of life and death."
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Miss Me But Let Me Go
When I come to the end of the road
And the sun has set for me,
I want no tears in a gloom-filled room,
Why cry for a soul set free?
Miss me a little – But not for long
And not with your head bowed low,
Remember the love that we once shared,
Miss me – But let me go.
For this is a journey we all must take,
And each must go alone,
It’s all a part of the Master’s plan
A step on the road to home.
When you are lonely and sick of heart
Go to your friends that we know,
And bury your sorrows in doing good works,
Miss me – But let me go.
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What is dying?
I am standing on the sea shore.
A ship at my side spreads her
white sails in the morning breeze
and starts for the blue ocean.
She is an object of beauty and I
stand and watch her until at last
she fades on the horizon.
Then someone at my side says
“There, she has gone” –
Gone where?
Gone from my sight – that is all.
She is just as large in the mast,
hull and spars as she was
when she left my side....
The diminished size
and total loss of sight
is in me and not in her,
and just at the moment when
someone by my side says
“She is gone,”
and others take up the glad shout
- “There she comes.”
- Bishop Brent 1862 – 1929
Bishop of the Philippines
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SORROW TURNING INTO JOY
Neither our natural attachment to life nor our courage in bearing suffering, neither earthly wisdom nor even faith - however great - none of these can preserve us from the sorrow for the dead. Death is a twofold phenomenon: there is the death of the departed, and the suffering and deadening in our own soul, occasioned by this painful process sorrow, gloom and despondency is forbidden to the Christian. He must not recoil when faced with suffering nor remain impotently passive before it. He must exert his spiritual powers to the utmost in order to emerge from it stronger, deeper and wiser.
No matter if we are weak in our faith and unstable in our spiritual life - the love we bear towards the departed is not weak; and our sorrow is so deep, precisely because our love is so strong. Through the tension of our love, we too shall cross the fatal threshold which they crossed. By an effort of our imagination, let us enter into the world which they have entered: let us give more place in our life to that which has become their life; and slowly, imperceptibly, our sorrow will turn into joy which no one can take from us.
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Alone
We may feel terribly alone, cut off from everybody. We may find it hard to speak. We may feel that no one can understand what we are going through. Yet we are united with Christ, so we are one with him with the person we love. We can reflect for a moment on these words of prayer: "May God unite us with all the saints and faithful departed. May we be given a merciful judgment, so that redeemed from death, freed from punishment, reconciled to the Father, carried in the arms of the Good Shepherd, we may deserve to enter fully into everlasting happiness in the company of the eternal King together with all the saints."
(Based on a prayer from the Funeral Rite)
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The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I shall want.
Fresh and green are the pastures where he gives me repose.
Near restful waters he leads me, to revive my drooping spirit.
He guides me along the right path; he is true to his name.
If I should walk in the valley of darkness no evil would I fear.
You are there with your crook and your staff; with these you give me comfort
You have prepared a banquet for me in the sight of my foes.
My head you have anointed with oil; my cup is over flowering.
Surely goodness and kindness shall follow mw all the days of my life.
In the Lord’s own house shall I dwell for ever and ever
(Psalm 22)
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Grief
Grief cannot be shared, for is mine alone,
Grief is a dying within me,
a great emptiness,
a frightening void.
It is loneliness, a sickening sorrow at night,
on awakening a terrible dread.
Another's words do not help.
A reasoned argument explains little
for having tried too much.
Silence is the best response to another's grief.
Not the silence that is a pause in speech,
awkward and unwanted,
but one that unites heart to heart.
Love, speaking in silence, is the way into
the void of another's grief.
The best of all loves comes silently,
and slowly too, to soften the pain of grief,
and begin to dispel the sadness.
It is the love of God, warm and true,
which will touch the grieving heart and heal it.
He looks at the grieving person and has pity,
for grief is a great pain.
He came among us to learn about grief,
and much else too, this Man of Sorrows.
He knows. He understands.
Grief will yield to peace - in time.
Cardinal Basil Hume, OSB
