ON THE day after Christmas, the year of my ordination to the priesthood, I was in the Church sacristy preparing for a funeral mass, my first in the three months since ordination. Two minutes before the liturgy commenced, the funeral director whispered that the deceased had committed suicide.
NO ONE in the family told me. As I welcomed the family and received the body of the deceased in the name of the Church, I was acutely unprepared for this tragic circumstance and of my existential inadequacies as a presiding priest.
NEVERTHELESS, I was consoled by my intention to minister to the very best of my ability. I felt the power of the Holy Spirit and the strength of the Church. As the moment approached for the farewell commendation, I realized that the funeral liturgy had summoned me to a farewell experience of my own.
AS I read the words of St. Paul's Letter to the Romans--"we know that our old self was crucified" [Rom 6:6]--I bid farewell to the deceased and adieu to the scholastic I had come to know before my ordination. I said goodbye to the honeymoon of my priesthood and the weeks of first fervor, my untested idealism and a goodly amount of my embarrassing naivete.
