Funeral, The Rite of Christian Burial

Recently Deceased and Funeral Information

Just like baptisms and marriages, so at death: The rites of a community serve several purposes. They convey a great deal about how death is understood in the group, and about what relationship there is between the living and dead. They may also convey the meaning of this individual’s life. The rites will handle the time of transition from life with this person present in the community to life with this person absent. This recognizes that death ordinarily brings a group-family, neighborhood, church-into a different way of being. Changes like this are always difficult. They may challenge the existence of the group itself, or at the least call people to new roles and new understandings.

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Liturgy of the Hours

Long ago, our ancestors in faith had ways for individuals and households to praise and thank God constantly, with the poetic richness of praying at morning and evening with hymns and psalms known by heart. As time went on we lost those forms of prayer. In more recent times, some substitutes were found: the prayers called the morning offering, the act of contrition, the Angelus and other prayers related to the time of day. For some, these too have been …

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