November 3, 2024

Revelation 21:1-6a; John 11:32-44

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “See, the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them as their God; they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them and be their God; he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more…”

This Sunday, we observe All Souls Day. It is the day we remember all those who have died. Those we know and those we do not know. Of course, those we know are more salient to us, more tied into our memories. At different stages in our lives, we will encounter people, and in time we will eventually lose some of them. That is the nature of this life.

The Feast of All Souls is therefore an occasion for remembering those we have known and perhaps even those we do not know. Those family members of legendary status whose stories have been carried on through the ages. Sometimes with great pride, sometimes with great humor. And sometimes as a cautionary tale.

As with Shakespeare’s plays, we learn differently from the comedies and the tragedies. The happy stories with everyone getting married and the villain getting their comeuppance. And the tragic tales of loss that serve to remind us of what not to do.

I was thinking the other day that there are very few happy endings in the Bible. There are victories after battles. There are stories of redemption. There are more than a few miracles. But there are not many happy endings. Certainly not in the New Testament and a scant few in the Hebrew scriptures.

This week we have the story of Lazarus. It is a sad tale that is turned around in a most improbable way. It is often turned to with hope because it demonstrates the power of God even in the face of death. But I would also imagine it as a complicated story to share with someone who is struggling with their health or the health of someone they care about.

See, look what happened with Lazarus.

But how then might we think about such a miraculous result in the lives of ordinary people. We do not have the same frequency of miracles these days, outside of the medical establishment. Perhaps we have domesticated our miracles, which is not an entirely bad result. It is not perfect, but it is more within our grasp.

This week we watched another movie, the Disney film Coco. It is about a boy, Miguel, who wants to be a musician, but his family forbids anything to do with music. Miguel’s great-great grandfather had been a musician, but he disappeared on the road while performing and his great-great grandmother could never forgive him. And so, music was banished from family life to appease her grief.

The film is set during a festival for the Day of the Dead, or Dia de los Muertos. It is a Mexican holiday related to All Hallows Eve, or Halloween, but it is not about dressing up or giving out candy. It is generally observed through family gatherings to honor one’s ancestors, those who have died. The family will put up a home altar known as an ofrenda. On it will be photos and mementos of the people who have passed on. There will typically be flowers, often marigolds, and offerings of foods. People will also tend to the family graves in cemeteries, often placing photos and foods on or near to those grave sites.

In the movie, Miguel somehow ends up crossing over into the land of the dead where he meets with all the members of his family from his home ofrenda. They try to get him back into the land of the living, but his great-great grandmother Imelda wishes to condition her help by making Miguel promise never again to perform music – talk about controlling. Miguel refuses and runs off to find his unnamed great-great grandfather, the musician, to get his blessing without that condition.

Like any Disney movie, there needs to be a crisis, one that can be resolved in about ninety minutes’ time. There are predictable chase scenes and unexpected challenges. The good guys win and the bad guys get punished. In this case, the crisis has to do with Miguel having to return to the living world before sunset. And with helping Hector, a deceased musician, who spoiler alert, unexpectedly turns out to be his long lost great-great grandfather.

You see, Hector has been trying to visit the living world on the Day of the Dead. When people set up their ofrendas, the family altars, and place photos and flowers on them, the ancestors can cross over and visit. They can take back the sweets and drinks laid out for them provided they declare them at afterlife customs.

But more importantly, as long as they are remembered in these annual rituals, the spirits of the ancestors will continue existing in the very colorful and lively afterlife as depicted by the finest Pixar animators. However, when you are no longer remembered on this Earth, you will cease to exist in that other world. And no one in the afterlife knows what happens to you after you fade away.

So, to get this out of the way right now, that is not the version of the afterlife described in pretty much any religious tradition. It makes for a good story with time pressure and last-minute rescues, in this case by his family dressed up as Frida Kahlo impersonators. Don’t ask, just rent the movie.

Our personal salvation is not tied to the memories of people in the world. Because in two or three generations, any one of us will be little more than a family legend, maybe a photo on the mantlepiece with little or no understanding of who we were. That is a sad realization, I suppose. Honestly, I do not know the names of my great-great grandparents any more than Miguel in the movie.

Again, I do not think the ritual of creating a family altar, has anything to do with what happens to us in the afterlife. The Disney plot device notwithstanding, the practice of remembering those who have died has more to do with treasuring those memories, treasuring those people. Who they were and what they meant to each of us.

For example, I never knew my father’s mother, Grace Caggiano, because she died before I was born. But she was without a doubt my father’s favorite person in the world. He tells stories about her over and over – the same twelve stories mind you. And whenever he does so, he lights up a little bit. He will on occasion break into operatic song, because she was an opera singer. I of course cannot sing a single note without scaring small animals, but my family was filled with opera singers.

For me, the person I miss the most is my grandmother on my mother’s side. Her name was Lucia Pannucci, though she generally went by the names Lucy or Lu. She was my only grandparent born in the United States, the rest coming from southern Italy. She was from Orange, New Jersey, graduated from high school during the Depression, and supported her extended family on her secretary’s salary from the John Hancock Insurance Company.

My grandmother and I were each other’s favorite. She took pity on me the youngest child, the quiet one. Yes, quiet – some things change over the years.

My grandmother was also the center of everything when she was alive, holidays and so forth. Everything revolved around her house in Brockton, Massachusetts when we were young and then she moved next to my parents, and it all blended together.

My grandmother was a good person but there was nothing special about her other than she was special to me. Somehow, our lives can be filled with ordinary people who somehow become extraordinarily important. Important for how we look at life. Important for how think about living.

When I think about the movie version of the afterlife, it makes me laugh because I do not put my grandmother’s photo up on a special altar in early November. I do not put out marigolds or special cookies either. But on the wall of my kitchen, there is an index card in a frame. It is a recipe for tarale, a savory Italian biscuit like a hard pretzel, sometimes called wood cookies. I know, appealing. They are dipped in wine and were a staple of my childhood. And to be honest, I always hated the taste of them (“wood cookies” is a clue). But I loved the fact that my grandmother wrote on that index card in her careful cursive style. That is one way that I remember her.

This Sunday, our flowers are in memory of George Maliff. A few of you will remember George, who was a cantankerous fellow who would sit up front in his wheelchair. Our sexton Dana, our former music director Sam, and I would take turns riding out to his nursing home in Natick to bring him back and forth to church. George swore like a longshoreman in the car, but I got him to restrain himself inside the church. He told me endless stories, or endlessly told me the same stories, for many years. He died about ten years ago.

Well, it is a custom of mine to drive up to the North Shore and to get fried clams. I do this every summer with my daughter Alyssa and now my son-in-law to be, Jake. This summer was no different. We went to J.T. Farnum’s clam shack – which I recommend – and then we took another trip out to Dogtown, Massachusetts. This is a neighborhood in Gloucester and there is an old cemetery there. And that is where George Maliff is now.

For years, I thought I was the last person on Earth who remembered where he had been buried. I would drive over to the local Dunkin Donuts which is near to where George grew up in a big old Victorian built by his great grandfather. I buy a hot coffee, regular, meaning in New England speak “with cream and sugar.” I bring the coffee to George’s grave site and poured it out onto the grass. I knew the location from memory because there was no head stone. It was a few spots down from his grandmother’s stone by an overgrown bush.

Well, one year I went to the cemetery, coffee in hand, daughter along for the ride, and well fed on J.T. Farnum’s finest fried clams. But something had changed. Someone had purchased a headstone for George. It is a large stone in polished black granite. I have no idea who purchased that headstone, which must have been expensive.

I do not know who else has kept the memory of George alive after so many years. But I know that someone cared. Someone remembered. Someone made sure that George’s name was etched in stone as it had been etched into their memories.

There are many ways that we can remember the people in our lives. The families of our birth and blood. The families of chance and choice. There are many ways to honor their lives and to call to mind their memories. It can be about pictures on the walls or the rituals of the holidays. It can be about the stories we remember and the stories that we share again and again.

On this day for All Souls, let us remember those we have known. Those who have passed on like George Maliff. Like Sam Adams our former music director. Those from your own lives, family and friends, whether recently or long ago.

There is a prayer that I often recite at graveside, one from the Jewish tradition. I will end my remarks with these words in honor of those we have known and those we remember in love.

In the rising of the sun, and in its going down, we remember them.

In the blowing of the wind and in the chill of winter, we remember them.

In the opening of buds and in the rebirth of spring, we remember them.

In the blueness of the sky and in the warmth of summer, we remember them.

In the rustling of the leaves and in the beauty of autumn, we remember them.

In the beginning of the year and when it ends, we remember them.

When we are lost and sick at heart, we remember them.

When we have joys we yearn to share, we remember them.

So long as we live, they, too, shall live, for they are now a part of us, as we remember them.

 

Amen.