Batman Ben Farrell....

The saintly English King, Edward the Confessor, seeing how upset his friends were as he lay on his death-bed, consoled them all by saying; “Don’t be afraid, I’m going from the land of the dying into the land of the living.”

There was something other worldly about Ben.

From early on this lad was different – mature beyond his very young years. Alan and Val, you did so much and you and the family fought so hard. You and the wonderful medics and nurses and carers on both sides of the Atlantic. You can be confident that you did as much as you could for him. Yet, you said it seemed that it was Ben who was taking care of you.

In Michigan Valerie said “I wish I could take your pain for you.” Ben said; “No mammy, I wouldn’t want to give it to you – I can handle it.” There’s not a mother anywhere or a father who wouldn’t swap places in a heartbeat with a sick child. And every dad and mam, and nana and granddad, feels the pain of a child and walks it every step of the way. Ben could handle it because he comes from good stock. You made him what he is and was.

And in truth he was a superhero. He battled hard with the cancer, yet the small boy of five years old, had the power of Ali, or Brogan, or Ronaldo, or McGregor, and we feel his power now.

Whether it was singing “Show me the way to go home” out loud in the hospital and banging out the beat on the table, his favourite movie was Jaws. It was like Brody, Hooper and Quint singing on Quint’s boat the Orca after their tea.

Or singing an Oasis number with his dad Alan in the van. As he faced the sun he cast a shadow.

Or building another Lego empire, sometimes the trips to buy a sneaky box of Lego (hiding it behind his back with that cheeky smile)

Or whether it was Batman. You know, superheroes don’t hang around. They are always at the service of others. Just when we get to know Bruce Wayne the bat phone rings and Wayne dons the bat suit and he’s gone. They are too big for our world. And Perhaps Ben was too much of a force of nature for Planet Earth.

When the rest of us are struggling to stay young – Batman Ben lives forever young.

There’s no answer as to why this had to happen. But maybe we get a glimpse of the next world when we open our eyes, and not necessarily with our eyesight but with our insight. We see more clearly in here. And our faith, the faith what was given to us by our parents and their parents helps us to see in the dark. Faith lights up the dark. Ben is gone to heaven, there is no doubt about that, and we will see him again. You will see Ben again, Val, and Alan, and Jack. Down the road.

But you can connect with him anytime in Jesus Christ who loves us. And this connection point is more powerful than any superfast WIFI. And the signal never drops. But if I know Batman Ben, and you know him best, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you feel his power first, because he’s praying for you now. In the words of Chief Brody, “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”

(I asked Ben's parents, Valerie and Alan for permission to post this, the homily I gave  at his funeral Mass this morning)

St. Clare of Assisi...

Chiara Offreduccio was born into a noble family in Assisi on July 16^th 1194. Her father was Favarone Sciffi, Count of Sasso-Rosso and her mother was Ortolana. From a young age it was assumed that Clare was to marry in line with family tradition but at 18 years old she heard Francis of Assisi preaching and asked him could she follow him and live after the manner of the gospel. In March 1212 Francis received her into the order and placed her into the care of the Benedictine nuns of San Paolo. Her father made great efforts to get her out of the cloister and leave the order. Later she moved into a small church at San Damiano where she and her sisters stayed.  They soon became known as the Poor Ladies of San Damiano and they lived a life of poverty and enclosure according to a rule given them by St. Francis of Assisi. This vow of poverty was something that was for Clare non-negotiable. It was called the ‘Privilegium Pauperitatis’ which meant that for the Poor Ladies, they guarded this grace to live in absolute poverty and not having to take possessions.

As a way of guarding the life they had chosen, a Roman Cardinal, Hugolino, was appointed ‘protector’ of the order. He later became Pope Gregory IX. As pope, he visited the Poor Ladies and was concerned about living such a hard and austere life and suggested relaxing the vow to live this privilege of poverty. Clare was a tough lady and was having none of it. She told the pope “I wish to be absolved from my sins, but not from the obligation of following Christ.” For her and her sisters, poverty was just that, a privilege, which well lived, freed them from distractions in order to focus on following Jesus Christ.

Francis of Assisi guided the order until he died in 1226 and after his death, Clare became abbess of San Damiano. She took Francis’ spirit as a good benchmark for the living of the religious life with her sisters in poverty and enclosure and she fought off any attempt by church leaders to dispense her and the sisters from it. In 1224 the army of Frederick II came to plunder Assisi and the story goes that Clare came out of the enclosure and faced the Emperor down by holding the Monstrance with the Blessed Sacrament in her hands. The sight of this tenacious woman standing up to the emperor was enough to scare him so much that the army fled – terrified without harming anyone in the city.

On August 9^th 1253, Pope Innocent IV, in a papal Bull, a document given to Clare called ‘Solet Annuere’ confirmed that her rule would serve as the governing rule for the Poor Ladies way of life. Never would anyone in the future be in danger of watering down the rule of the Poor Clares. Clare died two days later on August 11^th, she was 59 years old. She was canonized Saint on September 26^th 1255.

In 1958 Pope Pius XII named St. Clare patron saint of television. 

                               The San Damiano Cross in the Basilica of St. Clare in Assisi