Of Revenge and Retribution.
This is a story about no one particular funeral.
There were two sides to old Merle’s family just as there were two sides to the argument that had been tossed about over the decades. Exactly how long no one could actually say. The cycle of retribution had grown stale and then viciously flared over the years. Perhaps it had started when somebody had eloped with someone they shouldn’t have. This was just one incident that was posited as to why there were ‘strong feelings’. Allegedly water was stolen, fences ‘damaged’, the footy shed jacked up in the middle of the night and returned to its ‘rightful’ resting ground.
When it came to arranging Merle’s funeral, delicate negotiations were the order of the day. Clearly no one side was going to ‘win’ and conversations were not helped by the lack of planning by Merle herself or a will.
Ultimately one side organised ‘’The Church bit” and the other side organised “The Wake bit”. It seemed an honourable compromise with both sides having a voice about some of the arrangements.
It is hard to get some calming perspective in scenarios like this but what I return to is the prayer that was found by the body of a dead youth (one of an estimated 50,000) in the Ravensbruck concentration camp. Perhaps it would have gone down well at old Merles funeral?
“O Lord, remember not only the men and women of goodwill but also those of ill-will.
Do not remember all the suffering they inflicted on us;
remember the fruits we have borne thanks to this suffering
– our comradeship, our loyalty, our humility, our courage,
our generosity, our greatness of heart and when they come to judgement
let all the fruits that we have borne be their forgiveness.”