Requiem Mass – Father Sheldon
Moody Smith (1926-2008)
Washington Memorial Chapel,
Valley Forge, September 8, 2008
+In the Name…
“And he said to me, ‘It
is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. To
the thirsty I will give from the fountain of the water of life without
payment, He who conquers shall have this heritage, and I will be his
God and he shall be my son’” (Revelation 21:6-7).
Father Sheldon Moody Smith
has conquered as a son of God because he kept the faith that had been
given to him as a gift. Sheldon Smith would never had said this about
himself, but I will- because I saw in the exercise of the priesthood
of Christ of which he was shared clear evidence of faith, devotion,
and service that could have been expressed by him in echoing the words
of St. Paul to Timothy, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished
the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me
the crown of righteousness…” (II Timothy 4:7-8).
I first met Father Smith in
the early spring of 1989 when I was being interviewed by Good Shepherd,
Rosemont as its next and 10th Rector. My wife, three children,
and I came to church here on a Sunday morning as we had been put up
at the Valley Forge Sheraton.
I observed Sheldon Smith as
priest who celebrated the liturgy of the Church with care, seriousness,
and deep devotion, and who delivered a very fine and inspiring sermon
built upon the Gospel appointed for that particular Sunday. He struck
me as one who was confident, yet humble; serious, yet warm; pious, but
not self-righteous or theatrical.
A few weeks after moving to
Rosemont in December of 1989, He invited me out to lunch. He was the
first priest in the area to do so. I clearly remember that I immediately
liked him and became quickly aware of what I had sensed from the distance
of the nave to the sanctuary a few months before to be true; and more
so that he had a keen, well-trained theological mind (the mind of a
scholar) that shaped and under girded his understanding of God, the
Church, and himself. He freely expressed his concern, frustration, and
sadness for the state of the Episcopal Church, and expressed his concern
for me as a brother priest 25 years his younger.
I sensed that his position
was that of obedience to St. Paul’s challenge and the promise within
it: “…be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the
Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain,” and that
meant being faithful to his ordination vows no matter what direction
the church, its bishops, and its conventions took. Lastly, his love
of and commitment to the sheep of his pasture as their pastor came across
loud and clear. Oh, one more thing, he was witty, relaxed, and secure
in who he was.
You all know that five years
after his retirement from the 26 years he served this church as its
Rector, he suffered a severe stroke. What a blow that was for him, Mary
Helen, his daughters and their husbands, his grandchildren, and for
all of us. When I would leave from a visit with him at Devon Manor,
I would just sit in my car and cry. But even in that condition, when
all changed so quickly for him (and when Mary Helen manifested her love
for him so devotedly and tirelessly, as loving and cherishing in sickness
and health was poured so beautifully), he kept praying, studying, and
caring. His priesthood lived on although he could no longer stand at
the Altar or in the pulpit. When he came to Good Shepherd for a Sunday
or weekday Mass, he dressed as a priest, and exuded priestly character
that was inspirational to me.
When a priest dies, there are
multiple griefs because in this case a husband and father have been
lost, but so has a spiritual father been lost for so many. A priest
is a man who continues the truth of the Incarnation that God became
Man and Christ called and calls men to the sacred priesthood to continue
His ministry of preaching, teaching, and healing as they engage in the
administration of the Church Catholic’s sacraments until Christ comes
again in glory. A priest stands in the place of Christ as Man as a man
who presents the fatherhood of God as Jesus did, and who said to Philip,
“When you see me, you see the Father.” He stood for so many years
at the Altar of God symbolizing Christ the Bridegroom to His Bride,
the Church. I know that Sheldon stood in and assumed that sacerdotal
reality with deep humility and great thanksgiving.
Sheldon Smith as a priest believed
and taught the truth that Jesus taught about Himself that we heard in
this Gospel today: “I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life; no
one comes to the Father, but by me.” Regrettably, there are bishops
and priests for whom the Church quite naturally assumes that they believe
this, and who have been entrusted to teach this, who don’t! For Sheldon
Smith, and for me, and hopefully for you, this caused and causes sadness
because Jesus is questioned and doubted and the people are left confused
and spiritually suffer.
Sheldon Smith believed as a
man called by Christ to be a priest that Christ Jesus is what he said
he was: “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and end.”
The Son of God was there in the beginning as the agent of creation and
is there at the end as Judge and King of Heaven.
When I elected a bishop three
and half years ago, I had the Greek Alpha and Omega carved into my episcopal
ring to remind me of Who is the beginning and end. May you and I never
ever forsake that truth.
The Church is Christ’s of
which He is the Head. It is not ours. We have no faith of our own, but
the received Faith and Order of the Church. The Church’s ministers
are Christ’s – called by Christ, redeemed by Christ, and owned by
Christ. And this Christ, who came in the fullness of time as the
Incarnate Son of God, is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
Father Sheldon Smith understood
this and strove to be obedient to the revealed religion of historic
Christianity because it contains timeless truth for all men and women
of and for all times and places. He knew the danger of what can happen
to one entrusted by the Church to be a preacher of the Gospel for God
– the danger being that of forging God’s signature at the foot of
the scroll of man’s own ideas, ideologies, passions, and preferences.
He was a man under obedience to the vows he had made when ordained a
priest, and he remembered the warning given to him in the 1928 Book
of Common Prayer’s Exhortation to those being ordained priests, when
the Bishop of Chicago read of the “high dignity” in which the Lord
was now placing them, and said, “…beware that neither you yourselves
offend, nor be occasion that others offend.”
He was not fearful of new ideas
and insights, but had the wisdom and sense as a student of human history
to discern what constituted theological development and what constituted
theological error. He understood himself as a priest to be in a long
line of accountability as a messenger, watchman, and steward of and
for the Lord.
His vocation of being a husband
and father was something he embraced with joy, satisfaction, and with
much joy. He quite naturally and devotedly would speak to me about me
(full of good pride) about Mary Helen, his girls, and the grandchildren.
Praise God that he was granted the gift of a long life to love and enjoy
them as he did.
Lastly, he proudly served in
the United States Navy in the Pacific theatre of World War II. Clearly,
such experience teaches any man as to what constitutes sacrifice for
a higher cause, and sobers one as to the depth of life and death issues.
For Sheldon, his patriotism and love of God and country was very strong
and inspirational to others.
I in no way am trying to canonize
Father Sheldon Moody Smith. He, like all of us here today, did those
things which he ought not to have done, and did not do those things
which he ought to have done. I’m sure that he had to face (as any
bishop or priest does) times when he was wrong, had made a poor judgment,
let people down, was lonely and felt despair, and hadn’t believed
strongly enough in the Lord and divine Providence. But he stood before
the Lord in the years of health and in his final years of sickness with
a spirit of humility, and with a life and ministry forged ever-deepening
dependence upon God’s grace and mercy.
The Church has lost a good
and faithful soldier who was not ashamed to confess the faith of Christ
crucified and who manfully fought under His banner against sin, the
world, and the devil. May we know, as he did, that this mortal life
is a preparation for the next, and that as St. Paul taught, “For we
must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one
may receive good or evil, according to what he has done in the body.”
As his soul has moved from the Church Militant to the Church Expectant,
let us continue to pray that in that larger life he knows more and more
the fullness of what he preached and taught as Christ’s priest, ambassador,
and servant, that he be cleansed from all sin and defilement, and that
we may be aided by the prayers of this adopted son of God the Father,
this servant and priest (who is a priest forever) of Jesus the Christ,
the Son of the living God, who is the beginning and end.
Rest eternal grant him, O Lord;
and may light perpetual shine upon him.
+May his soul, and the souls
of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God, rest in peace.
Amen.
+In the Name…
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