Saturday, January 05, 2008
a good life
Today I attended a funeral that was truly a celebration of a fruitful life dedicated to God and family. She was the mother of one of our neighbors -- she was 97 -- she loved to dance the Charleston. The funeral mass ended with the congregation singing Ain't She Sweet as the priest led the family out of the sanctuary. The bulletin contained this prayer of St. Francis of Assisi:
Lord make me an instrument of Thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
Where there is injury, pardon.
Where there is doubt, faith.
Where there is despair, hope.
Where there is darkness, light.
Where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master;
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
and it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Lord make me an instrument of Thy peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love.
Where there is injury, pardon.
Where there is doubt, faith.
Where there is despair, hope.
Where there is darkness, light.
Where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master;
grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
and it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
