Posted on 07/21/2005 11:10:46 PM PDT by Crackingham
A parish priest has refused to give an Italian woman a Christian funeral because she had “lived in sin”. Father Giuseppe Mazzotta, parish priest at Marcellinara, near Catanzaro in Calabria, said that he had denied a Christian funeral to Maria Francesca Tallarico, who died of breast cancer at the age of 45, because she had lived with her partner but never married him. Her partner was separated and had an 11-year-old daughter.
“She lived with her lover, so she was a public sinner,” Father Mazzotta said. “I decided not to celebrate an official Mass for this woman, who was not in communion with the Church.”
Father Mazzotta said that he had performed the liturgy of absolution for the dead. He added that he was close to the dead woman’s family and had offered them “words of comfort”.
Father Antonio Sciortino, the Editor of Famiglia Cristiana, a popular Catholic magazine, accused Father Mazzotta of “excessive zeal”. Mario Paraboschi, a local councillor, said that he was perplexed. Father Mazzotta said that his action carried a message: “Marriage is a sacrament. We cannot simply pretend.”
The priest’s decision has underlined the growing power of conservative Catholicism in Italy. The liberal and secular Left is increasingly alarmed by the return to “Catholic values” in politics and everyday life, which has clear implications for the general election, due next May.
Yesterday Romano Prodi, the leader of the opposition Centre Left, who hopes to oust the ruling Centre-Right coalition of Silvio Berlusconi, came under fire from the Church and the Right for suggesting that he would follow “the French example” and recognise homosexual “civil unions” if he were returned to power.
Signor Prodi said that he would not go so far as Spain and legalise gay marriage, but Il Giornale, the conservative newspaper owned by the Berlusconi family, said that that was the logical next step.
| 1684 The Christian funeral is a liturgical celebration of the Church. The ministry of the Church in this instance aims at expressing efficacious communion with the deceased, at the participation in that communion of the community gathered for the funeral, and at the proclamation of eternal life to the community. |
| 1685 The different funeral rites express the Paschal character of Christian death and are in keeping with the situations and traditions of each region, even as to the color of the liturgical vestments worn. |
| 1688 The liturgy of the Word during funerals demands very careful preparation because the assembly present for the funeral may include some faithful who rarely attend the liturgy, and friends of the deceased who are not Christians. The homily in particular must "avoid the literary genre of funeral eulogy" and illumine the mystery of Christian death in the light of the risen Christ. |
| 1686 The Order of Christian Funerals (Ordo exsequiarum) of the Roman liturgy gives three types of funeral celebrations, corresponding to the three places in which they are conducted (the home, the church, and the cemetery), and according to the importance attached to them by the family, local customs, the culture, and popular piety. This order of celebration is common to all the liturgical traditions and comprises four principal elements: |
| 1261 As regards children who have died without Baptism, the Church can only entrust them to the mercy of God, as she does in her funeral rites for them. Indeed, the great mercy of God who desires that all men should be saved, and Jesus' tenderness toward children which caused him to say: "Let the children come to me, do not hinder them," allow us to hope that there is a way of salvation for children who have died without Baptism. All the more urgent is the Church's call not to prevent little children coming to Christ through the gift of holy Baptism. |
| 335 In her liturgy, the Church joins with the angels to adore the thrice-holy God. She invokes their assistance (in the funeral liturgy's In Paradisum deducant te angeli. . .["May the angels lead you into Paradise. . ."]). Moreover, in the "Cherubic Hymn" of the Byzantine Liturgy, she celebrates the memory of certain angels more particularly (St. Michael, St. Gabriel, St. Raphael, and the guardian angels). |
I'm not Catholic either, but I totally agree with the priest. A person who lives a blatantly anti-Christian lifestyle should not be accorded the dignity of a Christian funeral. By giving them a Christian funeral you are claiming them as "one of ours", which gives validation to their sin.
This reminds me of the passage that instructs us not to associate with someone who is called a Christian brother, yet is a fornicator or other notorious sinner. By shunning/disfellowshipping/excommunicating them (until they repent), you are upholding God's holy standard. Conversely, to treat them as "brothers" defames God's name in the eyes of the world: "See, that person is a fornicator and the other Christians accept him! So it must be okay."
I think that giving an unrepentant sinner a Christian funeral falls in the same category. Unless, of course, the preacher has the guts to say, "This man went to HELL! And you will too, unless ye repent...."
Careful now.
As you say, you are not Catholic. We Catholics certainly can do what we want and need no permission to do so from those outside the Church. Most Catholics have the manners to refrain from butting into your fantasies and suggesting how your church (if you have one) ought to govern itself or conduct its own business. You ought to behave likewise.
One thing I guarantee you is that you are right in imagining that you will be very surprised if and when you reach heaven.
Believe as you see fit. God is merciful as well as just. He gave you free will and will probably credit your sincerity. Still and all, it is three or four yards and a cloud of dust from age of reason to death and not the old (you should pardon the expression) Hail Mary pass play once and once only at, say 18 years of age, of accepting, etc. that will get you to heaven if you get there. Just a little counterpropaganda and truth that you don't want to hear in response to the usual stale and erroneous anti-Catholic propaganda which adequately catechized Catholics chuckle at hearing every time.
If you are still breathing, you are not yet saved. Christ has offered you the merits of His suffering and death of the Cross and you will be saved if you die in a state of grace. Free will is a gift of God and that gift persists until your death. A book, even THE book, and a few reading lessons notwithstanding, your theology leaves much to be desired. No one died and left every Tom, Dick and Harriet with the capacity to read whatever "translation" of the Bible through the prism of an agenda and a half to avoid the truth a theological authority. If it were otherwise, there would be one Protestant church and not ten thousand squabbling sects, each with its own wrinkle on the meaning of God's Word.
Henceforth, MYOB. If we need your advice, we will be sure to ask. Don't hold your breath waiting.
Also, I believe Keating mentions that it has something to do with back in the Roman Empire, when Catholics were routinely burned to death, i.e. turned to ash.
To be fair, if sinning disqualifies a person from a Catholic funeral, I don't think any of us Catholics would qualify for one...
Some people raising funds for a new organ at the local Catholic church knocked on D. L. Moody's door. The noted fundamentalist preacher surprised everyone by making a generous contribution. He explained, "I'd rather my neighbors were Catholic Christians than not Christian at all. And if they're going to be singing God's praises, I'd rather they had the means to do it well!"
The last century's greatest American calvinist theologian, R. J. Rushdoony, gave Pius X credit for erecting the doctrine of papal infallibility as a firewall against the corrosive assults of "modernism." This bulwark held, he said, for nearly a century, all the way 'til Vatican II. Now that the cat is out of the bag, I pray that Catholic faithful will have the grace to kiss off (flush out) the apostates, and soberly rebuild their Christian civilizations.
Meanwhile, I'm investing in protestant missions to Europe.
Balch3: I posted #85 before reading your #41. Please accept my apology for my misunderstanding.
In theory I agree with the priest in this situation. To hold a public church funeral for a woman who openly lived in sin with a married man and showed no signs of repentence would be very inappropriate. The problem with this kind of sanction is that it seems very arbitrary and inconsistent. Many people will see it as the big bad Church picking on some poor woman who died of cancer at a young age, while church funerals are allowed for other manifest sinners, especially the rich and powerful (e.g. various Kennedys) This causes scandal as well. The problem lies in the fact that the decision about whether or not to hold a funeral is made by the local priest and bishop. Unfortunately many priests and bishops will never do what this priest did. They are too spineless or simply do not believe the Church's teachings on sin and the afterlife. Thus you have inconsistency throughout the Church. To people who are not Catholic or who are poorly formed in their Catholic faith, this is very confusing. The message that the Church intends to send when it denies a funeral to a public sinner is lost and in the end the Church just looks mean-spirited and hypocritical.
Out of curiosity, when is cremation allowed in the Catholic Church?In addition to the reasons already given, cremation is allowed when the body is sent to another state for burial. For example, after my brother's funeral in New York, my sister-in-law had his body cremated, and the "cremains" (that's what the funeral director called them!) were sent to New Hampshire for internment in the family plot.
Lighten up, Francis
Had Hitler died after the War and his relatives asked for a Catholic funeral, should he have been given one? For someone who has lived scandalously and never repented, a public funeral is somewhat of a mockery. Should a mafioso who was an active and unrepentant criminal until hs death be given a Catholic funeral? No.
The Kennedy family asked their family priest, and she ok'd it ...
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