A Memorable Memorial Service For A True Saint

Scores of relatives and fellow church members came together
to bury one of our loved ones. -photo by Judy Yoder Peachey

I emailed this to members of my extended family following the memorial service Saturday near Stuarts Draft for my beloved brother-in-law, 91. He was a minister of the Mt. Zion Beachy Amish Church for over 50 years, and was one of my first pastors as well as the faithful husband of my sister Lucy, who died in 2003:

I was deeply blessed by the service today for  Alvin Schrock. In the early half hour when family members and some of Alvin's closer relatives met together before the 10 am service at the Pilgrim Fellowship Church we again reflected on what a consistently godly, gentle and faithful servant Alvin was. 

I was also impressed by many of the time-honored rituals of the church, like having the entire group of attenders, some 300-400, pass by members of the family as they walked in quiet procession past the open casket in front of the sanctuary. Along with this demonstration of their respect, folks often reached out their hand in blessing as they passed by members of Alvin's family. 

I used to question that procession and that ritual, but wonder if it might not have some real healing value for everyone, in spite of how the family, in its time of grief, is so vulnerably and publicly exposed in their grieving. 

At the end of the viewing, all of Alvin's descendants, as families, stood together for their own last time at the open casket, with the congregation's empathy filling the place in a way that was palpable and powerful. Then at the very last, the adult Schrock siblings joined together for their own last time of reflection by the open casket, with the oldest, Barbara Ann, gently covering her beloved father's upper body with a soft cloth cover as if to "lay him down to sleep." The two sons then closed the casket in preparation for the procession of scores of cars to the Mt. Zion cemetery. It was all enough to make your heart hurt.

All of this was without any professional funeral home staff present as ushers and directors of the event. This was meant to be an intimate experience by the church, of the church and for the church (in fact numerous churches) of which Alvin and his family were a part.

At the graveside there was the unforgettable ritual of the pallbearers, all members of the family, gently lowering the casket down into the grave, securing the homemade wooden vault with its homemade wooden lid, then proceeding to cover the grave with the clay subsoil--and then the dark topsoil--of the freshly dug resting place for their beloved father and grandfather. Meanwhile, hymns were being sung in four-part harmony by friends and family members, who took turns, with shovel in hand, adding to the blanket of earth that would be the body's last resting place, which was then carefully covered with the sod that belonged to that small spot of ground.

These people seem to know how to bury their dead--and how to support each other in their grief and celebrate with each other their bittersweet memories of a loved one for whom they were bidding farewell. And then to celebrate with a farewell meal and a kind of family reunion together afterwards.

Or as we were constantly reminded, farewell for now.

I'm reminded of the Irish blessing that goes, in part: 

"May the earth be soft under you when you rest upon it,

tired at the end of the day.

May the earth rest easy over you when at the last you lie under it.

May the earth rest so lightly over you

that your spirit may be out from under it quickly,

and up, and off, and on its way to God."

Rest in peace, Alvin S. Schrock 1927-1919  - photo Judy Yoder Peachey