Requiem Mass for Andrew Torquil Arblaster

St. Mary’s Church, Upper Woolhampton, 3 December 2011

Fr Geoffrey meets the family accompanying Andrew’s ashes at the entrance of the church.

During the procession, all sing Requiem Aeternam from the Mass for the Dead:

Collects

First Reading from Isaiah

Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness, you who seek Yahweh. Consider the rock from which you were hewn, the quarry from which you were dug. Consider Abraham your father and Sarah who gave you birth. When I called him he was the only one but I blessed him and made him numerous. Yes, Yahweh has pity on Zion, has pity on all her ruins; he will turn her desert into an Eden and her wastelands into the garden of Yahweh. Joy and gladness will be found in her, thanksgiving and the sound of music. Pay attention to me, my people, listen to me, my nation, for a law will come from me, and I shall make my righteousness the light of peoples. My justice is suddenly approaching, my salvation appears, my arm is about to judge the peoples. The coastlands will put their hope in me and put their trust in my arm. Raise your eyes to the heavens, look down at the earth; for the heavens will vanish like smoke, the earth wear out like a garment and its inhabitants die like gnats, but my salvation will last forever and my righteousness remain inviolable. Listen to me, you who know what righteousness means, a people who take my laws to heart: do not fear people's taunts, do not be alarmed by their insults, for the moth will eat them like clothing, the worm will devour them like wool, but my righteousness will last forever and my salvation for all generations.

Responsorial Psalm 122

Response: Let us go to the house of the Lord

I was glad when they said to me, ‘Let us go to the house of the Lord!’
Our feet are standing within your gates, O Jerusalem.

Jerusalem—built as a city that is bound firmly together.
To it the tribes go up, the tribes of the Lord.

As was decreed for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the Lord.
For there the thrones for judgement were set up, the thrones of the house of David.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: ‘May they prosper who love you.
Peace be within your walls, and security within your towers.’

For the sake of my relatives and friends I will say, ‘Peace be within you.’
For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, I will seek your good.

Second Reading  from Apocalypse

And I, John, saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, corning down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice from the throne, saying: Behold the tabernacle of God with men: and he will dwell with them. And they shall be his people: and God himself with them shall be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes: and death shall be no more. Nor mourning, nor crying, nor sorrow shall be any more: for the former things are passed away. And he that sat on the throne said: Behold, I make all things new. And he said to me: Write, For these words are most faithful and true. And he said to me: It is done. I am Alpha and Omega: the Beginning and the End. To him that thirsteth, I will give of the fountain of the water of life, freely.

Gospel according to John
If you love me you will keep my commandments. I shall ask the Father, and he will give you another Paraclete to be with you forever, the Spirit of truth whom the world can never accept since it neither sees nor knows him; but you know him, because he is with you, he is in you. I shall not leave you orphans; I shall come to you. In a short time the world will no longer see me; but you will see that I live and you also will live. On that day you will know that I am in my Father and you in me and I in you. Whoever holds to my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me; and whoever loves me will be loved by my Father, and I shall love him and reveal myself to him.' Judas – not Judas Iscariot – said to him, 'Lord, what has happened, that you intend to show yourself to us and not to the world?' Jesus replied: Anyone who loves me will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we shall come to him and make a home in him.

Homily

Bidding Prayers

Liturgy of the Eucharist

During the offertory, Dear Lord and Father of Mankind is sung: