An example of a Catholic burial service for the aborted

I’m still looking for the exact words of internment, but here is an example of a Catholic service that was held for other abortion victims.

Bagpipes accompanied the procession of the tiny white coffins from the hearses to the burial site. “Yes, Jesus Loves Me” softly floated across the air. Churches in the Chino Hills area had named each of the babies. Those names were read aloud during the Friday evening service as each casket was carried to the grave in procession from the hearses by pallbearers from the “adoptive” church.

About a dozen floral sprays decorated the temporary pulpit. Some arrangements featured blue and pink colors. One wreath was adorned with baby items shoes, pacifiers, building blocks. One spray consisted solely of white and red carnations symbols of innocence lost by bloodshed. A book and a cross was given to each baby, blue for the boys, pink for the girls. On each cross was the shape of a hand, cupping a curled babe, as if the Lord’s palm was holding the sleeping infant.

As the small coffins (about 2 1/2 ft x 1 1/2 ft) were brought past the podium and the assembled crowd, they were given to funeral grounds keepers who then reverently stacked them in one of three white burial vaults.

After all the caskets were brought forward, a Catholic priest, Father Michael Maher, pastor of St. Paul the Apostle Church in Chino Hills, blessed the ground with holy water. The Liturgy of the Word followed. Psalm 23 was read with the responsorial, “The Lord is my shepherd. There is nothing I shall want”. Although the priest said little, his actions spoke volumes. Prayers of the faithful were offered, and the priest led the congregation in the Lord’s Prayer.

Next, The Reverend Len Thrush, of the Chino Brethren in Christ church read from the book of Ezra, chapters 9 and 10. In his sermon he spoke about how society had forfeited the wealth of children for the wealth of materialism. His remarks seemed to echo the words of Pope John Paul II in the “Gospel of Life.”

A third minister read a poem he had written on the morning he learned that the boxes of dead babies had been found by two boys playing. He connected this with the experience of a parishioner who had a crisis delivery coinciding with the discovery of the babies’ remains. How sad to think that it was children playing who first found the boxes! What must have gone through their minds?

After the sermon, the priest blessed the coffins, in preparation for interment. A woman walked to the podium to announce that a single white dove would be released to symbolize the need of all persons to join as one body, to prevent such horror in the future.

Then fifty-four doves were released, one for each spirit of the fifty-four babies. The bagpipes played, “Amazing Grace” and all joined in singing. Young children (or as the minister reminded participants, “those lucky enough to be born after 1973”) were invited to come forward, take a blue or pink carnation from an assistant, and place it in one of the three burial vaults.

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