Resources for Funeral Programs
Most
families like to create and distribute a simple program for the Funeral
Mass or Memorial Service of their deceased loved one. Following are
some inspirational quotes that can be copied and pasted into Program
Templates found within most word processing software:
“The belief that love can reach into the afterlife, that reciprocal
giving and receiving is possible, in which our affection for one another
continues beyond the limits of death—this has been a fundamental
conviction of Christianity throughout the ages and it remains a source
of comfort today. Who would not feel the need to convey to their departed
loved ones a sign of kindness, a gesture of gratitude or even a request
for pardon?”
— Pope Benedict XVI, Spe Salvi, 48
“It is a sweet thought to dwell on, that those I most tenderly
love, love God, and if we do not meet again here, in heaven we shall
be separated no more.”
— St. Elizabeth Ann Seton
“How good it will be when the veil is lifted at last, and we
have the joy of being face to face with Him whom alone we love!”
— Blessed Elizabeth of the Trinity
“In the mystical Body of Christ the souls of the faithful meet
overstepping the barrier of death, they pray for each other and in charity
realize an intimate, exchange of gifts.”
— Pope Benedict XVI
“Like any reasonable human being, the Christian sees his life,
from his birth to his death, as a continual coming to be, accompanied
by a continual passing away. But the Christian believes that in this
coming to be and through it, the immortal person he is is being born
and growing, the human being he is is being fashioned day by day and
he will remain what he has become in and for eternity.”
— Madeleine Delbrel
“All people desire to leave a lasting mark. But what endures?
Money does not. Even buildings do not, nor books. After a certain time,
longer or shorter, all these things disappear. The only thing that lasts
forever is the human soul, the human person created by God for eternity.”
— Pope Benedict XVI
“Death is grim, of course, my dear daughter, but the life beyond,
which God in his mercy will give us, is most desirable. Truly, in no
way must we lose heart because, even though we are weak, our weakness
is not nearly as great as God’s mercy toward those who want to
love Him and place all their hope in Him.”
— Letter of St. Francis de Sales to St. Jane de Chantal
“In
old age, how should one face the inevitable decline of life? How should
one act in the face of death? The believer knows that his life is in
the hands of God: ‘You, O Lord, hold my lot’ (cf. Ps 16:5),
and he accepts from God the need to die: ‘This is the decree from
the Lord for all flesh, and how can you reject the good pleasure of
the Most High?’ (Sir 41:3-4). Man is not the master of life, nor
is he the master of death. In life and in death, he has to entrust himself
completely to the ‘good pleasure of the Most High’, to his
loving plan.”
— Pope John Paul II
“The life which God bestows upon man is much more than mere existence
in time. It is a drive towards fullness of life; it is the seed of an
existence which transcends the very limits of time: ‘For God created
man for incorruption, and made him in the image of his own eternity’
(Wis 2:23).”
— Pope John Paul II
“It is clear that this [Resurrection] event is not just some
miracle from the past, the occurrence of which could be ultimately a
matter of indifference to us. It is a qualitative leap in the history
of ‘evolution’ and of life in general towards a new future
life, towards a new world which, starting from Christ, already continuously
permeates this world of ours, transforms it and draws it to itself.”
— Pope Benedict XVI, April 15, 2006
“O Lord, hear my voice when I call; have mercy and answer. Of
you my heart has spoken: ‘Seek his face’. It is your face,
O Lord, that I seek; hide not your face.”
— Psalm 27
“So I raised my voice from the very earth, from the gates of
the nether world, my cry. I called out: O Lord, you are my father, you
are my champion and my savior.”
— Sirach 51: 8
“If anyone loves me, he will hold to my words, and my Father
will love him, and we will come to him, and make our home with him.”
— Jn 14:23
"The seed of eternity existing in each one of us reacts against
death because that seed is itself not reducible to mere matter....For
God has called us and continues to call us to cling with all our being
to an everlasting share in the imperishable divine life."
— Gaudium et Spes, 18
“Where might the human being seek the answer to dramatic questions
such as pain, the suffering of the innocent and death, if not in the
light streaming from the mystery of Christ’s passion, death and
resurrection?”
— Pope John Paul II
“Man rebels against death because he bears in himself an eternal
seed which cannot be reduced to mere matter. Hence to every thoughtful
man a solidly established faith provides the answer to his anxiety about
what the future holds for him. At the same time, faith gives him the
power to be united in Christ with his loved ones who have already been
snatched away by death. Faith arouses the hope that they have found
true life with God.”
— Gaudium et Spes, #18
“Through Christ and in Christ, the riddles of sorrow and death
grow meaningful. Apart from His gospel, they overwhelm us. Christ has
risen, destroying death by His death. He has lavished life upon us so
that, as sons in the Son, we can cry out in the Spirit: Abba, Father!”
— Gaudium et Spes, 22
“So it is that the union of the wayfarers with the brethren
who sleep in the peace of Christ is in no way interrupted, but on the
contrary, according to the constant faith of the Church, this union
is reinforced by an exchange of spiritual goods.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church 955 (2)
“There lies the wonderful certitude of the Christian which resolves
all that is tragic in this uncertain life, for, in truth, all has already
ended happily in a new beginning that has all the freshness of youth.
And because this is so, the Christian can already gaze backwards as
one of the blessed and can see all earthly things transfigured and love
them as such. For all the things of this world that we really love…already
belong to his ‘new earth.’ The whole of creation has become
his mystery.”
— Hugo Rahner
“Those who feed on Christ in the Eucharist need not wait until
the hereafter to receive eternal life: they already possess it on earth,
as the first-fruits of a future fullness which will embrace man in his
totality. For in the Eucharist we also receive the pledge of our bodily
resurrection at the end of the world: ‘He who eats my flesh and
drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last
day’ (Jn 6:54). This pledge of the future resurrection comes from
the fact that the flesh of the Son of Man, given as food, is his body
in its glorious state after the resurrection. With the Eucharist we
digest, as it were, the ‘secret’ of the resurrection. For
this reason Saint Ignatius of Antioch rightly defined the Eucharistic
Bread as ‘a medicine of immortality, an antidote to death’.”
— Pope John Paul II
“Perhaps, more than in the past, modern man is consumed by material
interests and concerns. He seeks security and often feels lonely and
anxious. But death is not the last word. Death—the mystery of
the Virgin[Mary]’s Assumption assures us—is the passage
to life, the encounter with Love. It is the passage to the eternal happiness
in store for those who toil for truth and justice and do their utmost
to follow Christ.”
— Pope John Paul II
“To rise with Christ, we must die with Christ: we must ‘be
away from the body and at home with the Lord.’ In that ‘departure’
which is death the soul is separated from the body. It will be reunited
with the body on the day of resurrection of the dead.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1005
“The Christian Creed - the profession of our faith in God, the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and in God's creative, saving,
and sanctifying action - culminates in the proclamation of the resurrection
of the dead on the last day and in life everlasting.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 988
“Christ, ‘the first-born from the dead’ (Col 1:18),
is the principle of our own resurrection, even now by the justification
of our souls (cf. Rom 6:4), and one day by the new life he will impart
to our bodies (cf.: Rom 8:11).”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 658
“We firmly believe, and hence we hope that, just as Christ is
truly risen from the dead and lives for ever, so after death the righteous
will live for ever with the risen Christ and he will raise them up on
the last day. Our resurrection, like his own, will be the work of the
Most Holy Trinity: If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead
dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will give life
to your mortal bodies also through his Spirit who dwells in you.
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 989
“Do not weep, for I shall be more useful to you after my death
and I shall help you then more effectively than during my life.”
— St. Dominic
“I want to spend my heaven in doing good on earth.”
— St. Therese of Lisieux
“Belief in the resurrection of the dead has been an essential
element of the Christian faith from its beginnings. ‘The confidence
of Christians is the resurrection of the dead; believing this we live.
[Tertullian]’ How can some of you say that there is no resurrection
of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ
has not been raised; if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching
is in vain and your faith is in vain. . . . But in fact Christ has been
raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 991
“To be a witness to Christ is to be a ‘witness to his Resurrection,’
to ‘[have eaten and drunk] with him after he rose from the dead.’
Encounters with the risen Christ characterize the Christian hope of
resurrection. We shall rise like Christ, with him, and through him.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 995
“What is ‘rising’? In death, the separation of the
soul from the body, the human body decays and the soul goes to meet
God, while awaiting its reunion with its glorified body. God, in his
almighty power, will definitively grant incorruptible life to our bodies
by reuniting them with our souls, through the power of Jesus' Resurrection.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 997
“By death the soul is separated from the body, but in the resurrection
God will give incorruptible life to our body, transformed by reunion
with our soul. Just as Christ is risen and lives for ever, so all of
us will rise at the last day.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1016
“The lives of the saints are not limited to their earthly biographies
but also include their being and working in God after death. In the
saints one thing becomes clear: those who draw near to God do not withdraw
from men, but rather become truly close to them.”
— Pope Benedict XVI
“On many occasions have I not seen my parents in tears; when
Heaven had left them, but three children out of fourteen! But how often,
too, have not those three survivors, in adversity and in trial, counted
on the assistance of those brothers and sisters whom they had among
the angels! Such are indeed also of the family, and are brought back
to our minds in acts of unexpected assistance. Happy is the home that
can count one half of its members in Heaven, to help the rest along
the narrow way which leads there!”
— Blessed Frederick Ozanam
“The Church teaches that every spiritual soul is created immediately
by God - it is not ‘produced’ by the parents - and also
that it is immortal: it does not perish when it separates from the body
at death, and it will be reunited with the body at the final Resurrection.”
— Catechism of the Catholic Church, 366
“I have loved men greatly, and I feel this world of living creatures
has been so pleasant. I cannot go without tears. Nothing is farther
removed from me than stoic indifference, so how can I hope for the death
of a stoic? Plutarch’s heroes both terrify and bore me. If I were
to go to heaven wearing such a mask, I think even my guardian angel
would laugh at me. Why worry, why look ahead? If I feel afraid I shall
say: I am afraid, and not be ashamed of it. As soon as Our Lord appears
before me, may His eyes set me at rest...”
— Georges Bernanos, The Diary of a Country Priest
