A Gift of True Communion at My Mother’s Catholic Funeral

By Anne Monahan, Friday, March 16, 3:02 PMThe Washington Post

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/embraced-by-the-catholic-church-at-the-funeral-for-my-mother/2012/03/15/gIQAV12CHS_story.html

When my Roman Catholic mother died, I had a very different experience at her funeral than did Barbara Johnson,  the gay woman, recently denied Communion during the service for her mother at St. John Neumann Church in Gaithersburg.

 

Until my mid-20s, I was, as a friend commented, “a little more Roman Catholic than the Pope.” But after starting a news reporting career, marrying a good Irish Catholic in my family’s parish church and giving birth to three daughters in three years, I had many questions for the church. Soon I found that the church did not welcome questions and had unsatisfactory, rigid answers to many of them. In 1966 I voted with my feet and left for the Episcopal Church, where a priest told me, “We may not have answers but we’ll walk with you on the search for answers.”

 

My journey led to ordination as a priest and a 30-year ministry. Once the culture shock wore off, my parents proudly told the world, including their pastor and his assistant, “Our daughter is a priest.”

 

As my mother’s congestive heart failure approached its end stage, she and Dad informed their pastor that they wanted me to participate “up front” at her funeral. When she told me that the priest had agreed, I cynically thought, “The Second Coming will arrive first.” But I said I would ask about funeral participation when the time came.

 

Mom died in the early morning hours of a beautiful autumn day, and in the afternoon I called her priest to inquire about funeral planning. Prepared to be put in my place as an apostate, I gingerly approached the subject of participation, asking if I might read a lesson or lead the psalm.

 

“Oh, more than that. You can do anything you want,” Father responded.

 

“Anything?”

 

“Anything,” he repeated...