For the Fallen

 

For the Fallen
Requiem Mass for Andrew Dean Pimentel

8 July 2017 11:00 a.m.

Parish Church of Trinity, Ashland (Oregon)

The Rev. Fr. Tony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D.

 God, give us grace to feel and love. 

Take away our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh. Amen.

Shock.  Numbness.  Anger.  Bewilderment.  Yearning and an ache to be together once more.   These feelings are the life of those who mourn, especially those who mourn, like us today, a vibrant and joyfully energetic person struck down senselessly in their youth and vigor.   Oh Andrew!  There was so much right about your life.  There is so much wrong in your passing! 

When we face death, we always want to try to make sense of it.  But in this death there is no sense.   The person who randomly killed Andrew is so broken that it is hard to hate or even direct real anger at him:  this was, apparently, his way of fleeing the world back into a prison system that he thought was safe. 

When Jesus was among us, he healed the sick, made the mute speak, the lame walk, the mad whole again.  He taught that God above all was compassionate:  He makes the sun to shine and the rain to fall equally upon the just and the wicked.  He takes delight in creation, clothing the ephemeral grass and flowers of the fields with beautiful blossoms, better than the best array King Solomon ever donned!  He counts the hairs on our head and notes little sparrows when they fall from the sky.  God is like a loving father who runs to welcome wayward children home and then comfort their siblings who feel slighted by the grace shown their siblings who, they think, deserve PUNISHMENT.  God is like a crazy old woman who loses a coin, spends a day looking for it, and then spends a large sum for a party to celebrate finding it.  Uncleanliness and impurity for Jesus did not contaminate the pure and clean as taught in his religion, rather, purity and loving grace were contagious and overcame the hurt they touch.  Jesus describes God not so much as a king, despot or judge; rather he is abba, our papa. 

When we face death and illness, we want to make sense of it.  But maybe there is no sense to it at all, except for the fact that, as Jesus taught, it will end.   Illness will be healed.  Death itself will die.  Speaking of his own certitude that his preaching the reign of God and taking this to Jerusalem was going to get him killed, he quotes an expression of hope in the book of Hosea, “[the Lord] has struck us, but he will bind our wounds. He will revive us after two days; on the third day he will raise us up, to live in his presence” (6:1-2). 

“The reign of God has arrived, and is in your midst,” Jesus says, “So act like you’re part of it!  Pray ‘your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as in heaven!’  Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, visit prisoners, the sick, and widows and orphans. Build peace, and strive for justice!”

Andrew had a passion for life, and lived it fully in accordance with his sense of duty, honor, and camaraderie.   He was a fine hooker for the SOU rugby team.  As a former prop, I know that only the most courageous player, the one who trusts his teammates the most and plays without fear, succeeds in that role.  He pursued with energy and love his vocation as an Officer of the Peace.  At the end he tried to defend and protect those with him.  One of the things he was proudest of was being asked to raise the U.S. national ensign at the World War II D-day beaches in Normandy.  His passing made me think of a poem I read years ago written about the young heroes who died in Flanders Fields and the trenches in World War I.  Though Andrew was not a soldier in war, and though his country was the United States and not England, I think you’ll see why Andrew’s death brought this to mind:

For the Fallen

With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.

Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres.
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,
They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England's foam.

But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;

As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain,
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.

(--Robert Laurence Binyon, 1869-1943)

Liz and Tag, Katie, Alexis, all you friends and colleagues of Andrew:  Andrew believed in courage.  Courage is not just grace under fire: it is the ability to keep focused on the good and the right, on our task and mission, when evil and horror are breaking our hearts.   Sometimes it is just keeping on moving forward through the pain because that is the only thing we can do.  Despair and hopelessness is not an option.  We must not be overcome by regret for what is lost:  we must gently smile at the joy Andrew brought into our lives.  

There is not a lot I know about God.  But I do know that God is loving and holds all things.  There is no place, no matter how bad or painful, where God cannot do surprising and wonderful things, where God cannot help us in some way.  Death remains a great mystery for me.  But I have confidence that Death itself will die.   Sin, evil, and rottenness will all surrender to love.   In the end, all will be well.  The things that matter most will be all that’s left.  So I suspect we will be seeing Andrew again, and there will be no lost time in our relationship with him.  Jesus will greet us and wipe away any tears remaining on our faces, and bind up the wounds and scars in our bodies, minds, and hearts with his own scarred and wounded hands. 

Thanks be to God. Amen