PROPERS: BURIAL OF THE DEAD, RITE 2
TEXT: ROMANS 8:14-19,34-35,37-39
PREACHED AT THE MEMORIAL SERVICE FOR BARBARA TODD SIMARD AT ST. JAMES’ CHURCH, JACKSON, ON SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 2019.
ONE SENTENCE: We are reminded of the sacramental nature of existence in the life of Barbara Simard.
We gather here today, as friends and family, to remember – to memorialize – a remarkable friend and family member.
Barbara Todd Simard was not one to be contained by the boundaries of her native state. Although she was reared in a remarkable family with three amazing siblings, the gifts with which she was blessed beckoned her elsewhere.
Her parents were ahead of their times. They inculcated into Barbara a love… a passion… for music that was with her throughout her life. Her prodigious abilities as a flautist were recognized beginning in high school. She received more and more encouragement at each step.
Her journey led her north, to Oberlin Music Conservatory – no small step for a girl from Newton County, Mississippi. Even there, her passion was undiminished and she traveled to Quebec, where she shared the wealth of her talents. Her lack of knowledge of French was no impediment and it became not her second, but her first language.
It was in that French Canadian city that she found the love of her life, Jacques. And in that union of lives, she cherished and treasured his three children. All of this points toward the fullness of life she had found.
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I suspect all of us here love music. Some folks’ taste may tend toward Rock and Roll, Country, Folk, Bluegrass or some other genre. Barbara’s, of course, was Classical – and her abilities as a musician were prodigious.
Even though our individual tastes may differ from others, I suspect we all have known the experience of being transformed by music. The pieces of music we love take us to places we would never go otherwise. Those transcendent experiences of being touched deeply and profoundly point us toward something beyond ourselves.
Those experiences – those tunes – may change over the years. I can look back on my days in high school and recall the incredible freedom I felt with Steppenwolf’s tune, Born to be Wild. Not something befitting an adult or a man of the cloth.
But as I have grown older – and hopefully matured – I have been touched by different music at various stages of life. Now, I find beauty and emotion in hymns such as They Cast Their Nets in Galilee, written, I might add, by a Mississippian, William Alexander Percy.
Most recently, I have been moved by the Pastoral portion of Handel’s Messiah. I have found myself thinking, this must be what heaven sounds like.
The point is this: Music points us to something deeper; something much more profound. In fact, it is something which is sacramental – an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace. The very definition of sacrament.
If Barbara was here bodily with us, I suspect she would agree with that assessment. Music is sacramental – it takes us from the mundane, transforms our reality, and points us toward something which is much greater than we know in this limited world. We are transported to a place of beauty, a place beyond the limits of human finitude.
We do that, too, as we sing together, and as we gather together around this holy table. It points us to something beyond this meager meal of bread and wine. It points us toward the reality that Barbara now knows fully – a reality that we can only intuit in the silences and phrases of the prayers we offer.
We encounter here the ultimate mystery – that which theologian Paul Tillich called the ultimate concern. Another Paul, the Apostle Paul, described that mystery in the 8th Chapter of his Letter to the Romans. It is, perhaps, the high point of the New Testament. Hear his words again:
I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God.
Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us. Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
In other words, this life in which we live – and the life which Barbara lived – is the here and now, but it points to a reality beyond itself.
Other than the obligatory, each of us is here because of our relationship with Barbara and our relationship with life. We sense in her and in this world something that is beyond. We sense it in the beauty of music, in the grace of relationships, in the gentle touch of those we love, in the power of forgiveness, and yes, even in the grief of standing here memorializing one who was so dear. We come to know that there is nothing that can separate us from the essence of life.
`The challenge for us is to find the meaning – the nugget of gold, the polished diamond – amidst the cacophony of everyday existence. Barbara… music… the grace of prayers… the stillness of silence… those who we know and treasure… point to the ultimate reality for which we all yearn. They point the way. They beckon to us.
Let us heed their call.
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