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The InterVIEW

Rites of our faith can console you in times of grief

A regular feature of The Catholic New World, The InterVIEW is an in-depth conversation with a person whose words, actions or ideas affect today's Catholic. It may be affirming of faith or confrontational. But it will always be stimulating.

There’s a crisis in our midst. It’s a growing lack of understanding of the Catholic view of death and the importance of having a Christian burial, which is seen in the nationwide trend of fewer people requesting religious burials for themselves or loved ones.

But they can be missing out on the grace and consolation faith offers in time of loss and mourning. So Catholic Cemeteries in the Archdiocese of Chicago hired Chicago native Deacon Glenn Tylutki as outreach coordinator to work with parishes, schools and groups to come to a greater understanding of what the church offers her faithful through the Rite of Christian Funerals.

He spoke with Editor Joyce Duriga about this new ministry.

Catholic New World: Catholic Cemeteries in the Archdiocese of Chicago created this outreach position because it saw a gap in people’s understanding of Catholic funerals and rites. What is the message you are trying to convey?

Deacon Glenn Tylutki: Every baptized Catholic has the opportunity to share in the Rite of the Order of Christian Funerals. These rites bring together and celebrate a life of faith that was lived and now will live forever.

Very often in life that which we do on a regular basis becomes both familiar and ordinary. Both the gift of our faith and the active practice of our faith are not ordinary.

The church offers as a gift to its members the funeral rite of the church called the Order of Christian Funerals — a vigil for the deceased (wake), funeral liturgy (Mass) and the final committal (burial in a Catholic cemetery).

Though the location of each gathering is different, the spirit is the same; and it is the spirit that gives us the gifts of hope, healing, thanksgiving, wholeness and peace at a time of confusion, testing and loss.

CNW: What are the funeral rites?

Tylutki: The Order of Christian funerals begins with the vigil (wake) for the deceased and is the first way that the church captures the sentiments of the grieving and sets them in the context of our faith. It is truly a time to laugh and a time to cry, a time to remember and a time to pray.

It is a time for the beginning of healing for those who are hurting. It speaks of the faith of those gathered around the deceased and prepares us to enter into the Christian spirit of the funeral Mass.

The funeral Mass is our great “thank you” to God who created us, died for us and who is calling us back to himself. In this celebration the focus shifts slightly from an emphasis on the deceased to God’s saving works through Jesus.

The Mass, particularly at the time of death, is truly a special moment because it gives us the opportunity to ask God to show his mercy, compassion and forgiveness to our loved one. We give them a lasting gift of our love and of our faith.

The Rite of Committal is the last concrete act we can do for our loved ones in this world. The burial or entombment of the full body or the cremated remains of the human body within a Catholic cemetery is a profound statement of our belief that we profess in the Creed: “We believe in the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.”

CNW: You particularly want to reach Catholics aged 25 to 40 with this message. Why?

Tylutki: One cannot actively participate in something if one does not first fully understand what one is doing and why. Secularization of our society has lead to fewer children being educated within the Catholic educational system.

Because of this situation many between the above ages, as they have come to bury their loved ones, do not see any personal or spiritual value — either to the deceased or to themselves — in the inclusion of the rites.

CNW: Do we have burial rites for infant deaths, stillborns or miscarriages?

Tylutki: Yes. Because human life begins at conception, any moment of life deserves that same sacredness of God’s creation of the total human body.

The outreach ministry of education and evangelization by Catholic Cemeteries is intended to act as a liaison between it and our Catholic hospitals to assure that the dignity and respect of human life is being carried out to that final rite of “Prayer and Committal.” It is to be celebrated with the parents to give them comfort and to commend and entrust their infant to God.

CNW: Not many of us like to talk about death, but you’ve mentioned that it’s not something to fear. Why?

Tylutki: As practicing Catholics, we are ever mindful of the communion of saints — the community gathered here on earth, the suffering souls in purgatory and the community gathered triumphantly in heaven.

Death is not something to be feared because it is our belief that life has changed for those we love. Because of Christ’s resurrection, life for all of us will change but will never end. Christ has told us this through Scripture. We cannot gain immortality without first giving up our mortality.

Is that final change in death easy for any of us? No. If Jesus could weep at the tomb of his friend Lazarus, why would we feel we should do any less? But because we are people of faith, our grieving is not without hope.

It is in the knowledge of and the promise of the Resurrection that Joseph Cardinal Bernardin as he approached his own death was able to say in 1996: “While I know that, humanly speaking, I will have to deal with difficult, difficult moments, I can say in all sincerity that I am at peace. I see death as a friend, as the transition from earthly life to life eternal.”