Indeed, not even death could defeat this good man, for he man was tough enough to kneel beside his bed every night and pray to God for the graces he would need to know his will and to do it…begging even for the grace to die to die a good death, and to fall into the arms of God when his time had come.
Jeffrey got that from somewhere. In the beginning he got it from the day that Raymond and Aquitina brought their little baby to this Church to be be baptized, when, in the presence of the Bissonettes, his godparents, Father Hebert took water in a small golden shell and pouring it over the Jeffrey’s forehead said: Ego te baptizo, in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sanctus. “I baptize you, Jeffrey, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”
And thus began a great journey, as Jeffrey was joined to the death and rising of Christ Jesus. He would learn how to pray, how to kneel down and say his prayers, and to be a good Catholic. He learned it from his mom and dad, and his sisters Karyn and Judi and Lisa and Jane, and even the sisters in the school next door.
And then he met Donna. And while I’m not sure of all the details, I know their meetings had something to do with Lisa and some lounge on Main Street.
And so, Jeffrey and Donna stood before the Altar at Saint Anna’s and promised to remain faithful to one another and to God: a promise they lived together for forty-six years. And from that faithfulness, God brought forth Amanda as concrete signs of the willingness of Jeffrey and Donna to cling to faithful love in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health, until death.
In fact, on the day they were married, Jeffrey and Donna knelt before the altar as Father Porello, extending his hands over them, blessed them with a quotation from Psalm 128: videas filios filiorum tuorum: May you live to see your children’s children. And so faithful was God’s love for Jeffrey and Donna that they lived to know and to Anthony and Anastacia, and even Alaiyah, his great grand-daughter.
It is that same faithfulness which Donna and so many of you showed to Jeffrey to the end: a foreshadowing for Jeffrey of what the Communion of the Saints must look like in the Kingdom of Heaven, where someday, we pray, he will run out to meet us and welcome us home. The faithful love which you showed to him, Donna, is a sign to all of us of the faithful love of God, who never forgets us and is with us always until the end of time.
And that faithfulness came from somewhere. It came from the waters which poured over the head of that little baby sixty-nine ago. It came from the Holy Communion he received and the Confessions he made, the promises of marriage he kept, the sick whom he cared for all the good that he did.
I know that there were many gifts which Jeffrey gave to each of you throughout the years, but today he gives you the greatest gift of all. For today He reminds each one of us of the journey we’re on. It starts in the arms of our parents…it starts at the font of blessed water where we are first joined to Christ and to his Cross. And then it leads us to all kinds of places.
And it ends in the same place it began: before Christ, who will judge each one of us on the last day. Christ, who calls us to turn away from selfishness and sin, and cling to faithful love. Christ, who urges us to forgive, even as we ask to be forgiven. Christ, who laid down his life for the world, and asks us to do the same. Christ, who loved us faithfully and then commanded: love others as I have loved you.
And so we pray for Jeffrey, and ask God to forgive him whatever sins he may have committed and to welcome him home to heaven, as we pray for ourselves, and ask God to give us the grace to be faithful to the love to which Christ calls, a love without measure, a love which redeems and leads us to eternal life.
