Funeral Homily for Bill Burke--The Rev Melanie Lemburg

Bill Burke's funeral homily

March 12, 2022

        Before I talk about Bill, I’d like to offer greetings to Bill’s family who aren’t able to be here today but who are watching this service online—Connie, Bill’s wife; Ritt, their son and their granddaughter Lindsey. 

        Bill Burke was a quintessential 8 o’clocker, that rare breed of individual who choose to go to the earliest church service of the day.  Before the pandemic, he showed up for the 8:00 service every single Sunday, and every Sunday, his job was to carry the cash and the checks from the offering collection from the church over to the office.  On the rare Sundays he wasn’t here, he made sure someone else was lined up to take care of this job.  I never once had to worry about it. 

        That’s just the kind of man Bill was.  He took care of people by tending to the details that affect us.  Bill brought this care for and attention to detail to all areas of his life—as a husband, a father and grandfather, a leader in both the workforce and in this church, and as a friend.  Up until the very end of his days, Bill was caring for people, taking care of details, wanting those who he loved to have a better, easier life. 

        But not only was Bill able to get things done, he had the rare ability in such detailed do-ers to be able to inspire other people to get things done as well.  Just here at St. Thomas, he served multiple stints as Senior Warden, the priest’s right hand person, and his work in that role included literally and physically building up God’s church. Under Bill’s leadership, we built this church under which we shelter today and we built the parish hall where we will gather afterward.  Whole sections of our St. Thomas history book were written by Bill Burke, again both literally and figuratively.

        I’ll never forget on Sunday that Bill pulled me aside after the 8:00 service.  He had a small smile on his face as he asked me if there was a particular reason we had not prayed a certain prayer in the service.  It took me a minute to recall what he was talking about, and then I realized and shared with him that I had just plain forgotten to pray that optional prayer which was our custom to pray in that service right before we had communion.  Bill smiled bigger and said, “You know, I don’t really feel like I’ve been to church until I pray that prayer.”  And I don’t think I forgot it again after that, and every week, as we prayed it, I thought of Bill Burke. 

        We call this particular prayer “the prayer of humble access.”  We pray it right before we have communion, and it’s a hold-over from our 1928 prayer book.  After Bill shared with me his attachment to that prayer, I always felt like I had a small peek into the depths of this good man’s soul.  Here is what the prayer says:

We do not presume to come to this thy Table, O merciful

Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in thy manifold

and great mercies. We are not worthy so much as to gather

up the crumbs under thy Table. But thou art the same Lord

whose property is always to have mercy. Grant us therefore,

gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of thy dear Son Jesus Christ,

and to drink his blood, that we may evermore dwell in him,

and he in us. Amen. (BCP p 337)

        We gather today to give thanks for Bill Burke, for the way that he took care of us and made this world a better place, all with a humble awareness of the mercy and love of the God whom he served.  We mourn his loss in this life with us.  And we gather today to remember our hope, to remember Bill’s hope—that death is not the end but a change; that through Jesus’s death and resurrection God has shown once and for all that God’s love is stronger than absolutely anything, even death.  We gather today to remind each other that our Lord Jesus, who was Bill’s friend and not a stranger, has gone before him to show him the way to eternal life in God’s kingdom where there is no more suffering.  We gather to remember today that Bill is feasting at God’s heavenly banquet, not on crumbs, but on the richness of God’s love and mercy.  And we hold fast to the hope that one day we will all be reunited around God’s table, where God will evermore dwell in us and we in God. 

        We give thanks for Bill, for all the ways that he took care of us, and oh, how we will miss him.