HOMILY FOR THE FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT YEAR B (2)
HOMILY FOR THE FIFTH SUNDAY OF LENT YEAR B
HOMILY THEME: “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” (John 12:24)
BY: Fr. Robert deLeon, CSC
John 12:20-33
I received a phone call from a local funeral director. Could I do him and a grieving family a big favor, he asked. A priest was requested for a committal service at a local cemetery. Would I be able to meet the funeral party at the cemetery for the brief service? I assured him I’d be there at 11 AM on Friday.
When Friday arrived, the sun was shining and the air was balmy, a great day to be outside, even at a gravesite. Arriving a bit early, I sat in one of the chairs arranged beside the open grave for the grieving family. I imagined a future day when I’d be sitting as a family member in a folding chair beside a dark pit waiting to swallow a member of my own family. Then it hit me: The dark pit was also waiting for the day when I’d be lowered into it. The headlights of the approaching funeral procession brought me back to the moment.
The pallbearers brought the casket up to the grave as grieving family and friends followed. Most seemed old and frail, canes pulling them across the spongy ground to the gravesite. The funeral director guided the immediate family members to the six folding chairs. And that’s where the somber decorum fell to shreds. Aunt Hilda refused to sit, proclaiming loudly to the chagrin of the weary, “The chairs are for the oldest and weakest. I’ll stand.” That began the tug of war, funeral director guiding old folks by the elbow to chairs as these same folks struggled with all their might to resist admitting they were the oldest and weakest.
Already at a disadvantage having had no previous contact with this family, I introduced myself, hoping for some small sign of welcome, but their lips remained tight with eyes concealed behind sunglasses. It seemed clear that this group of tough oldsters wanted me to get through the prescribed ritual as quickly as possible. With prayers completed in about fifteen minutes, I stepped back from the foot of the grave as the funeral director began to dismantle the large arrangement of pink roses atop the casket, handing each mourner a rose in remembrance of the departed.
In the gospel passage we hear today, Jesus reminds his followers that, “Unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit.” (John 12:24)
Though I stood at an open grave that Friday, I was surely more in the presence of life than of death. As I beheld the curmudgeonly spunk of the bereaved family, it was more emblazoned spirit that was present than fading flesh. Swinging canes and lashing tongues bespoke their vitality—“The chairs are for the oldest and weakest. I’ll stand.”
And so they stood in defiance of death, bustling back to their waiting cars at the service’s conclusion, the blooms in hand soon to lose both pink petal and delicate fragrance as stem and thorn toughened over time.
