Advice: Catholic funeral music

First, something personal. My mother Monique died this Sunday. It was not exactly unexpected, but still sudden. We had hoped she'd last a few more years. At least my sister and I made it to her hospital bedside while she was still conscious--I sprinted back from Ireland when I got the news. She was actually pretty okay, and we talked about McCain, who had just died.(1) She took a bad turn over the night.

She received last rites shortly before death. They were very powerful. I have never felt the litany of the saints as I felt it then. I was surprised that Saint Monica, her name-saint, wasn't in it, so I added that in my head. The next day was her feast. She never failed to remind me who Monica was. None of her children are Augustine, but there was a lot of St. Monica in my mother.

We are destroyed. As a mother, she was everything to us. We are now orphans. But she lived a long life, went without much pain, and died in the hope of the Resurrection. That's a lot.

I announce this here because some of you are my friends in faith, and because some of you know something about liturgy and such things. Perhaps some of you have dealt with Catholics funerals. (Of course, we called the church, but they haven't gotten back to us.) And frankly I need help.

My mom was a music teacher and a huge lover of classical music. She loved folk too, but hated modern liturgical music. Music was what she felt most powerfully in the mass and indeed, she drifted away from the church for many years, in part because the music got crappy.

I would love your advice on arranging for music for her funeral, and on good music within it. Spending money on liturgies makes my conscience itch a little. But there are so many stupid things you spend money on when someone dies. Just to put her in the ground on a Saturday is going to involve thousands of extra dollars! So we're going to spend what we need to get a funeral mass she herself would find beautiful. Music was her access to God, so it's fitting. If it were in my power, I'd hire a boys' choice or a priest who sung the whole mass, in Latin, French or English. I doubt that can happen. But surely we can do something.

Do any of you have advice on this? My understanding of liturgy is somewhat abstract. I've only been to a few Catholic funerals, even. How do I go about finding classical music that would work in the mass? I know some was written for the mass and some is more of a "performed" mass. Can we take, a kyrie eleison or an agnus dei from Fauré, Verdi, or Mozart, and have some instrumentalists and vocalists sing it where it belongs in the mass? Could we have a vocalist sing Pergolesi's Salve Regina, and if so, where in the mass? What overlaps are there between the TLM of classical Requiems and the Novus Ordo that would allow its present liturgical use?(2)

Needless to say, we have a call into the church's musical director. But I feel very unprepared for the conversation, as I don't quite know the way it's done.

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1. It's odd that my father's death was wrapped up in mourning for David Bowie, and now hers was the day after McCain. But she LOVED McCain.
2. We are not interested in a TLM; when I was in Boston, we attended a NO with good music.

My condolences to you and your family, Tim. My thoughts and prayers are with you.

I'm travelling at the moment and can't reply more comprehensively but will try to do so in the next couple of days.

>2 John5918: Thank you John. I figure you know these things. Her funeral will not be for 2+ weeks. So it's no rush.

My sincere condolences, Tim. I lost my mother, aged 89, just over 2 years ago. It's very hard.

She had a Catholic funeral mass, but we didn't have anything classical or fancy. Just Faith of Our Fathers, along with whatever else the St. Mary's organist came up with. Not much help for your search, but there it is...

Not at all what you're looking for, but in lieu of a sympathy card, a favorite song from a Cape Breton family of musicians
that celebrates time spent with much-loved friends (and family?):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4aLdgU-vXbc

>1 timspalding:

Tim, once again my condolemces. Requiescat in pace. I think the bottom line is that a lot will depend on your parish priest, and perhaps on the liturgical and musical personnel in the parish. A good parish priest will be very flexible and sensitive to the wishes of the family, but sadly you can't guarantee that will be the case.

When my mum died the funeral mass was led by a priest who did not know her as she had moved into a care home outside our old parish, and in any case our old parish priest had died a couple of years earlier and we only had a temporary new one who barely knew her. When I went to see the priest who was to preside and I presented our choice of hymns and readings he visibly relaxed, and was very happy that he didn't have to choose it all himself for someone who was a complete stranger to him.

There ought to be no objection to you having classical and traditional liturgical music for parts of the mass, nor to having some instrumental and vocal performances. There might be some objections to secular music - some people want to pack their funeral liturgy with pop songs and the like - but there should be no objection to any form of sacred music, and even a secular piece or two should be acceptable if sensitively and carefully chosen and if it has spiritual overtones. If you can find a priest who can sing parts of the mass, there should be no objection to that.

I would advise you to have a balance between performances and congregational singing, as it is good to get the congregation involved in singing together. I don't know what the make up of your congregation will be. If it is mainly regular churchgoers then you could choose from a broader repertoire of hymns; if they are not regular churchgoers then better to choose a few of the really old well known hymns that they might know.

A good time for a performance, such as a vocalist singing Salve Regina, is during communion, or as a reflection after communion.

If you are having a eulogy, you'll probably find that the priest will not allow it to replace the homily. He should give a short homily, and the eulogy should be at a different point in the mass. If he knew your mother personally he may of course refer to her in his homily, but the homily and the eulogy are two different things.

I hope that helps you to clarify some of your options.

I sprinted back from Ireland when I got the news

When I got the news that my mum was dying, aged 90, seven years ago I sprinted back from Kenya, but unfortunately she died thirty minutes before I reached the care home where she was living. I got a call while I was on the train from the airport from my sister-in-law who was at her bedside with my sister. But my mum's body was still warm when I arrived and I was able to say my goodbyes to her before the funeral industry intervened. When my dad died of a heart attack thirty years ago I didn't make it back for his funeral. I was in Khartoum, the airport was flooded, we were up to our necks (literally) in helping people in the shanty towns who had been flooded out, and normal life was so disrupted by the floods that getting the required exit and re-entry visa in time was impractical. Although my dad was not a Catholic, our old parish priest gave him a good Catholic funeral, and a number of priests from the missionary order I was working with pitched up to concelebrate and give moral support. RIP.

>6 John5918:

Will reply to liturgy details later. I have found out more myself, but some of what you say is very helpful.

I'm so sorry you didn't reach either parent in time, but specially your mother when it was so close. That sounds very hard. I'm glad she had family there. I'm haunted by the fact that, although I spoke to my mother at length, we were still under the impression she'd get better, so our conversation was somewhat trivial. We spoke more about McCain's death--which just happened. The next day, she was fading fast, and didn't know much. That said, "saying goodbye" to her would have been harder if she had been fully conscious.

"The funeral industry" is right. It's dreadful.

>7 timspalding: "saying goodbye" to her would have been harder if she had been fully conscious.

That's more or less what my sister and sister-in-law said to me when I arrived. They had been with her for the last 24 hours or more and they said even when she was conscious she was not really aware of them and probably wouldn't have recognised me. Giving her still-warm body a hug and talking to her was quite meaningful for me.