On several occasions I have spoken at the funeral of a deceased relative, friend or neighbor. I have always prayed for inspiration at those times, that I might say those things that would be comforting for the family of the deceased person. It is easy to find good things to say about a deceased person, even if I had only known them a short time. If I didn’t have many personal things to say about a person, I would spend more time talking about the gospel aspects of death and dying.
There is a story about a women and her three children sitting in the front row of the church during the funeral of her husband. The minister, speaking in behalf of the family, began telling about what a wonderful husband and father the man had been. What a great bread winner, and how charitable he had been to the needy and down trodden, etc., etc. The more he went on speaking of the deceased person’s virtues, the more nervous the wife became. Finally she nudged her 12-year-old son sitting next to her and asked him to sneak up to the open coffin below the podium and look in to make sure that was his Dad in there. Was the preacher really talking about their husband and father?
For the most part, it is very unlikely that a person will hear anything negative about a deceased person at their funeral.
The old sexton stood by a grave newly made,
With his chin on his hand, his hand on a spade:
Who is the judge when the soul takes its flight?
Who is the judge twixt the wrong and the right?
Which of us mortals shall dare to say
That our neighbor was wicked who died to-day?’
In our journey through life, the farther we speed,
The better we learn that humility’s need
Is charity’s spirit that prompts us to find
Rather virtue than vice in the lives of our kind.’
Therefore good deeds we record on these stones;
The evil men do, let it rest with their bones’
I have labored as sexton this many a year,
But I never have buried a bad man here.’
—from “Journal of the Association for the Preservation of the Memorials of the Dead in Ireland” Vol. 2 Part I (1895)
Let us so live that when we come to die even the undertaker will be sorry. (Mark Twain)