Memorial Day Mass honors the dead

Friday, May. 29, 2015

During the Memorial Day Mass at Mount Calvary Catholic Cemetery, Archbishop John C. Wester, administrator of the Diocese of Salt Lake City, said it was appropriate to honor “those who gave their life for our country, so that we might enjoy the freedoms that we have today. We honor them for their sacrifice, and we thank them through our prayers for what they did for us.”

The Mass was concelebrated by Monsignor Colin F. Bircumshaw, vicar general; Monsignor J. Terrence Fitzgerald, vicar general emeritus, and several priests of the diocese.

The living owe a debt of great gratitude to those who made the ultimate sacrifice, Archbishop Wester said. “I think it’s important that we remember them, and the details of their sacrifices, so that we might imitate them in some small way.” 

Through Christ’s Passion, death and resurrection, humankind has been given life eternal, the archbishop said, and “in Jesus Christ we are one with our beloved dead forever. They live on, and one day we will be with them again forever in eternity. That is the hope and the faith that we bring to this celebration today. It’s not just faith and hope, it’s love and charity because God is love, and Jesus formed us as a community of believers.  … It is here in this Eucharist that as a community of believers we are one with our beloved dead and with each other in a very special way as members of the community of saints. Because of our baptism, death no longer has its sting; it no longer has power over us, and so we are one with our loved ones just as we were when they walked this earth.”

Christians are called to live in communion with each other and with the dead, he said. “It is when we resolve to live a life of love and self-sacrifice, as did our beloved dead, that we are more in union with them. What better way, then, to honor our beloved dead than to re-affirm our desire to live in peace with one another, and harmony with one another, and in forgiveness and reconciliation with one another?”