All Souls’ Day Vigil 2024
Preacher: The Very Rev'd Dr Paul Shackerley
Date: Saturday 2nd November 2024
Service: All Souls’ Day Vigil
My earliest memories of funerals and deaths go back to childhood in the valley where I grew up, in Tredegar….
…mainly men dressed in black waiting outside on the streets the close to the hearse. Services rarely took place in churches or religious buildings. I remember it was the custom, when someone died in the street, or in a neighbouring street, all blinds and curtains would be closed until after the funeral, as a mark of respect. That doesn’t happen anymore. Funerals took place in the deceased homes, at the hearth/fireplace, with close family member with prayers led by a Chapel Elder. Then, only the men, dressed in black, would go to the graveside. No women or children were allowed. Indeed, children would usually never attend a funeral but stayed with another neighbour to be cared for until it was all finished. Women at graveside and children at funerals were frowned on. Adults thought they were protecting children from the harsh realities of death. It wasn’t healthy, but it was the custom and believe. The women stayed to make the tea and sandwiches and serve the men when they came back from the graveside before they went to the working men’s club… without the women of course. Women weren’t allowed in the working men’s clubs in those days.
We all remember in different ways. And we now sit in the Church’s calendar for a few weeks of remembering. Yesterday, All Saints. Today, All Souls, and next Sunday, Remembrance Sunday. I am sure many of us will remember our loved ones on their birthdays, anniversaries, Christmas, or other important days they shared with us when they were alive, like holidays, or marriages perhaps. What if I asked you, where were you and what were you doing on 31st August 1997 (the day news broke that Princess Diana died)? Or, if asked you to remember where you were and what you were doing on 11th September 2001 (when planes crashed into the towers in the World Trade Centre)? Or where were you on 08 September 2022, when Her Majesty the Queen died. We have memories. We all remember at different levels. I remember reading many years ago that ‘God gives us memories, so we can have roses in winter’.
Yet, the reality is, remember is not easy. Remembering as we do today on All Souls, brings back the pain of our loss. It isn’t easy to remember when the relationship we shared had its difficulties or when we feel that there were things we wanted to do or say but didn’t get the chance. Remembering loss can also carry feeling of guilt, shame, and regrets. Sometimes remembering is the last thing that we want to do or feel able to do.
I would say to all of you here this evening, that you are courageous. Yes, we should not underestimate the courage takes us to remember loved ones this week, to gather with others on All Souls’ Day here in the Cathedral who have experienced loss, to remember and honour our loved ones in whatever way feels appropriate for us at this time. Grief and sadness lurk deep in our hearts, and it doesn’t take a great deal to trigger those feelings. It take courage.
You may wonder why are still crying after all this time, if it has been many years since the death of a loved one, or why you can’t pray. In painful, sad times, we can’t find the words to pray. Please don’t worry about it, because tears is your offering of prayer to God. Even your tears are gifts to God. The Psalmist wrote God ‘has collected all my years in his bottle’ (Psalm 56:8). Tears are your prayers, and in your sadness, you also have courage to remember.
Those of us who have lost loved ones know the realities that ‘love without pain is a lie’ (James Woodward). And, the Book of Common Prayer service At the Burial of the Dead we are reminded of our human fragility and heartache that comes with loss. It reads, ‘in the midst of life we are in death.’ Yet, society deals with death in a very different way to the 1662 Prayer Book and the society from which it emerged.
We receive graphic images and reports of death almost daily through the news and media. What has happened is that we have become alienated from death. We no longer know where to place it. ‘In the midst of life we are in death’, but as far as we’re concerned, in the midst of life we are busy ‘living’, making the most of our span of years. Perhaps All Souls’ Day is a reminder of our own mortality, as well as remembering loved ones, and the need to revisit our wills and funeral arrangements to make sure we do not add to the trauma our loved ones will experience when we die. It takes courage for us to face our own mortality as well.
The cutting edge of this remarkable week in the Church’s calendar of remembrance, through Remembrance Sunday and the celebration of All Souls’, is that we invite others who have lost loved ones to witness the Christian hope of resurrection. Tonight, All Souls’ Day, is also about holding on to that hope for the future, when we will share in the heavenly banquet with them and the whole company of heaven. When death breaks through our ordered or busy lives, often unexpectedly, the feelings of anxiety, fear and deep sadness, flood in and we lose control. In all our remembering, we hold contradictions and battle emotions together in an unresolved tension, often living with unanswered questions and with doubting faith. That’s all we have are our tears to offer. Tears are a sign of the quality of love you had, and still have for those we, for a moment, no longer see, hug, speak with, share life with. They are in the heavenly place where there is no more weeping and tears.
The Christian faith has a strong tradition of remembering. As Jesus approached his own death, we’re told that he shared a simple meal with his friends. He urged them to remember Him every time they break bread and drink wine together as we do every week in this Cathedral Church. He knew that He was going to die, but he wanted his friends to know that he would never leave them. When we gather for this meal (Eucharist), we remember Christ’s death, resurrection and ascension, and his promise of his comfort and presence.
Jesus invited his friends to remember Him every time they ate bread and drank wine – an act of remembrance associated with life and all that lies ahead, not simply what lies behind us. I know that for many of us there will be times of day or simple acts that remind us of the person we have lost – it may be as we close the curtains at the end of the day or boil the kettle to make a cup of tea – that we say goodnight or good morning to the one we still love. Sometimes the act of remembering will trip us up as we seem to forget what has happened, at other times the act of remembering is our greatest comfort and strength. Be of good courage and hope, continue to love. For those who have died, live. It’s only that for them, life hasn’t ended, it has changed. And our relationship with them continues, but in a different guise.
The Cathedral is open every day of the year. Visit this holy place, sit in silence and remember. Light a candle to remind you that the light of Christ shines in darkness, because the light says to the darkness, ‘I beg to differ’.