“They whom we love and lose are no longer where they were before. They are now wherever we are.”
I have vivid memories of singing ‘Hail, Queen of Heaven’ with my mother, father and grandmother at Mass, and at other prayers. The family also sang it together at Nanna’s graveside. Whenever I sing that hymn, I am mysteriously and wonderfully connected to those times and people in a way I can’t fully explain. I remember those who have passed into eternity with gratitude and love, and feel their joy and strength still with me.
While many have been with God for some years now, they remain in a way that speaks of both absence and presence.
In November, we write their names in the Book of Remembrance and bless their memory. We light candles for them, we sing, and we speak their names with reverence and thanksgiving. We remember.
When we lose someone we love, it can be one of the most challenging times in our lives. Seasons of loss and grief are sacred times, and people will always remember how they were met and accompanied by God’s people in these vulnerable, threshold moments. Each November, as the Catholic Church observes the ‘Month of Remembrance’, we recall with love and gratitude those who have gone before us and remain in our hearts. We give thanks for their lives, and for the spirit they carried, which can live on through us.
All Saints Day and All Souls Day orient us again to the invisible world that surrounds our daily lives, the ‘great cloud of witnesses’ who now inspire and pray for us.
The Catholic Order of Christian Funerals acknowledges the reality of loss and separation for us and the community, while also recognising that a spiritual bond still exists between the living and the dead. There is a trust that ‘all the faithful will be raised up and reunited in the new heavens and a new earth, where death will be no more’ (OCF, §4). The funeral rites and our subsequent memorials allow those grieving to be consoled, while also offering thanksgiving to God for the lives of those who have died.
For a Christian, the life that began in the waters of Baptism and was nourished by the Eucharist has now returned to God’s merciful love. The bonds forged in life are not broken but changed. As the writer of the Letter to the Hebrews puts it:
Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and the sin that clings so closely, and let us run with perseverance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith, who for the sake of the joy that was set before him endured the cross, disregarding its shame, and has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of God (12:1–2, NRSV).
In November, the Church offers intentional time and space to remember the saints, those we love who are now home with God, and all the faithful departed. At the beginning of the month, All Saints Day and All Souls Day orient us again to the invisible world that surrounds our daily lives, the ‘great cloud of witnesses’ who now inspire and pray for us. We carry that spirit throughout the month in a heightened way, hoping in faith to join our voices—in years to come—with those who have gone before us in the heavenly chorus.
“Music has the power to weave powerful and lasting memory, holding person, place and time together.”
Recently I had the privilege of offering a workshop called Singing them Home at the 2025 National Catholic Liturgy and Music Conference in Adelaide. The workshop explored the wide range of music available for Catholic funerals and - most importantly - the ways to meet people with compassion in their grief.
Guiding families through the process of preparing for a funeral takes sensitivity and time—a ministry that could perhaps be more pastorally developed in some of our parish structures and practices. One idea that was well received by workshop participants was the suggestion that advance resources (including music resources) for understanding and planning a funeral could perhaps be provided by parishes or dioceses on their websites.
The process of planning a funeral with someone before they pass from this world into God’s loving care in the next can take the form of a prayerful meditation. This approach also allows other conversations to emerge: why a certain piece of music is important to that person; the memories associated with singing that song; the person’s hopes for their loved ones in the future.
Whether it’s a community joined together in singing a well-known hymn or a lone bagpiper playing ‘Amazing Grace’, music has the power to weave powerful and lasting memory, holding person, place and time together.
Singing, particularly, has the ability to build a powerful sense of community and unity. Describing the role of music in the Order of Mass, the Australian bishops write that ‘In the liturgy—the action of Christ in which the whole community of the faithful participates—no other sign brings out the communal dimension so well as singing, where many individual voices are fused together, blending into a single voice. Singing together fosters a strong bond of unity and sense of belonging,’ they write, helping ‘to develop the unity of mind and heart which is part of the mystery of the Church’.
Singing together in our funeral liturgies is a living sign of God’s presence with us, especially in our times of greatest sorrow and need.
As the Australian hymn ‘In faith and hope and love’ reminds us, ‘Christ, our shelter, Christ our friend’ is both ‘our beginning and our end. In faith and hope and love with joyful trust we move t’wards our Father’s home above.’
This November, as we move into this time of remembrance and thanksgiving, may we be comforted and inspired by songs that deeply connect us to our Creator, to each other and to all the faithful departed, and may God continue to be with us as we live out our earthly time as pilgrims of hope.
Fiona Dyball
Marist Association Member Warragul
Musician, educator and liturgist, currently completing her PhD at Charles Sturt University on the singing of the responsorial psalm in the Australian context.
This article was first published in Melbourne Catholic and is reproduced with permission.