Homily, Video, and Pictures from Abbot Brian's Funeral Mass

Thank you to all who attended Abbot Brian's funeral last Friday, October 18th. Below you'll find Abbot Elias's homily, a video, and a few photos from the service.

Funeral Mass Homily for Abbot Brian Clarke

[Readings: Isaiah 42:1-5,8a-9a; I Corinthians 2:6-9; Luke 6:43-45]

Faith of our Fathers! Holy Faith! We will be true to thee til death!  My dear brothers and sisters in the Lord, we gather today to commend to the mercy of God our dear Abbot Brian Clarke, a father in Christ to many of us.  Today, we bid farewell to an untiring and generous monk and priest, who persevered in the monastery until death. We also seek to support and console the Clarke and Carolan families.  Thank you for sharing your beloved uncle and cousin with us.  The presence of so many students, alumni, current parents, parents of graduates, oblates, parishioners and friends in this church is a testimony to the love and affection Father Brian enjoyed and a great consolation to those of us who already miss and mourn his passing from this life to eternity. 

While human language is often bankrupt in the face of death, the Word of God speaks to us a message of great hope about a man of great faith.  “The former things have come to pass… now I make all things new” (Is. 42:9), says the prophet to us in our first reading.  “Nor has eye seen or ear heard or has it some much as entered the human heart, what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor. 2:9) speaks the apostle in our second reading.  This is our faith!  This is the faith of our fathers!  This is the faith of our father in Christ, Abbot Brian.  

 That faith was first nourished in his Wainwright Street home in the Clinton Hill section of Newark by his devoted parents, Patrick and Catherine, whom we believe stand at the gates of paradise to welcome him home.  Father Brian spoke often and with great affection about his parents and siblings:  Marie Gillespie, Raymond and James Clarke who join in that family reunion in heaven today.  Vocations to service in the Church, my friends, are born and nurtured in good Catholic families.  This family not only gave us Abbot Brian, but four Little Sisters of the Poor, a Holy Ghost Father and a Redemptorist Priest.  Yes, today, there is much rejoicing in heaven: “The former has passed away, and now all things are new!” (Is 42:9)

Family and faith go hand in hand, at least for the Clarke and Carolan clans, and I imagine for many of us as well.  Each summer, the monks invite their families to campus for a reunion picnic, some softball games, swimming in the pool and the sheer pleasure of simply being together as family.  It is no surprise that Abbot Brian’s picnics were always the largest ones.  It seemed that everyone and any one of Irish Catholic descent was related by blood or by affection to Abbot Brian.  He surely made all of us feel that we were part of his family.  

Abbot Brian also spoke with much gratitude for the education he received from the School Sisters of Notre Dame at St. Peter’s Grammar School on Lyons Avenue in Newark.  He spoke especially of two nuns, Sr. Laurita (1^st grade) and Sr. Benedicta (2^nd grade).  A little boy at the time, Father Brian found Sr. Laurita curious.  She was left-handed, which was quite exceptional in those days, if not a bit mysterious.  So with a very playful grin on his face, little Hugh called her “Lefty Laurita.”  He remained friends with these two dedicated nuns for decades. This began a long and fruitful association with consecrated women in and beyond New Jersey.

Graduating from that parish grammar school, the eager teen when on to St. Benedict’s Prep in Newark, where he met the Benedictine monks who inspired his vocation to become a Benedictine monk and priest himself.   Upon graduation in 1949, he and three classmates: Benet Caffrey, Conal Coughlan and Thomas Confroy joined the monastery and made their novitiate together at St. Benedict’s Abbey in Kansas as was the custom at that time.  Making his first profession on monastic vows on the feast of the Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary on September 8, 1952, Father Brian remained always close to Our Lady.  We often saw him with a rosary in his hand, whether walking in the park, on this remarkably beautiful campus or in his choir stall of this abbey church.  

Having completed his philosophical studies at St. Vincent College in Latrobe and his theological studies here in Morristown, Brian Clarke was ordained a priest together with his three novitiate classmates at St. John’s Cathedral in Paterson, also on a feast of our Lady, the Visitation, in 1958.  Thereupon he began a long and distinguished career as an educator.  Like many of us, he taught whatever he was assigned to teach. But his forte and passion was teaching English literature, first at St. Benedict’s Prep and then at Delbarton, for more than 60 years.  He had a unique gift to inspire in young men a love for learning and a love for reading, and getting teenage boys to enjoy reading  literature is surely cause for sainthood.  Among his favorite authors was Flannery O’Connor, who produced countless short stories, letters and two novels.  In one work Abbot Brian often cited, she wrote, “I do not know you, God, because I am in the way. Help me push myself aside!”  That maxim describes Abbot Brian well and challenges us to push ourselves aside so the life of God can grow in us, or as the apostle writes, “to grow to the full stature of Christ.”  This is the life of the monk because it is the life of every Christian.  

“The abbot,” wrote St. Benedict, “must know what a difficult and demanding burden he has undertaken: directing souls and serving a variety of temperaments, coaxing, reproving and encouraging them as appropriate” (RB 2:31).  Well, the monks provided him with a rich variety of temperaments.  Especially during his tenure as abbot, in which there was great social and ecclesial unrest, we found in Abbot Brian a man of peace who led more by example than many words, imitating the Good Shepherd who searched relentlessly for that one lost sheep (Lk. 15:4; RB 2:7).  I am not really sure how he mustered the patience to deal with so many different characters.  

We sometimes found him in the autumn and spring seasons on the edge of the upper abbey field with a golf club in his hand and his pockets filled with golf balls.  He lined up the balls on the lawn and drove them past the lower abbey field and into the woods.  One day, I walked up to him and asked why he was driving golf balls into the woods.  He looked me in the eye and said, “Elias, I name each one of those balls.”  Then he smiled, put another golf ball on the lawn and drove it even farther into the woods.  I think that ball had my name on it.  That’s at least one way he dealt with a wide variety of temperaments.  

Yes, golf helped, as did manual labor in our garden and orchard.  He wasn’t afraid to get his hands dirty. But Abbot Brian’s true strength came from a deep friendship with God that spanned 89 years.  He was a faithful monk for 67 years, faithful to the communal prayer of this monastery, every day, four times day.  He also had a rich personal life of prayer, fed especially by his daily reading of the Bible, an ancient monastic practice we call lectio divina (RB 48:1).

We knew he was familiar with the Word of God every time he preached.  Beside walking in the footsteps of Jesus in the Holy Land, at the very places where these sacred texts occurred and were written down for our benefit, Abbot Brian knew the Bible inside and out, having read the entire Bible every year of his life, over and over again.  His homilies in this abbey church, at St. James in Basking Ridge, at Christ the King in New Vernon, at St. Michael’s in Cranford, at St. Joseph’s in High Bridge, at St. Peter’s in Bellville, at St. Benedict’s in Newark, at Sacred Heart in Wilmington, at Notre Dame of Mt. Carmel in Cedar Knolls, at Annandale prison and at area convents, always touched our hearts and offered us hope. 

Abbot Brian had so many gifts and talents, but coordination wasn’t one of them.  He was, frankly, clumsy.  I don’t think there was a bone in his body that wasn’t broken, bruised, twisted or sprained from his days with the Shamrock’s baseball team in Newark, to softball games with novices on this campus, to falling off the ladder on too many occasions in our apple orchard.  But that never stopped him.  Every class of novices worked side-by-side with Abbot Brian in our orchard, picking and sorting apples into three categories:  Class A for sale; Class B for the boys during soccer season; Class C for making cider.  

Some of us were better at apple picking and cider-making than others.  Honestly, I wasn’t good at the orchard work at all. I’m a city boy. Really? There are different types of apples?  Macintosh, Winesap, Cortland… they all seemed “delicious” to me.  Thankfully, at least some among us were mentored by Abbot Brian so that we still have fresh vegetables from the monastery garden and still enjoy a variety of apples and home-made cider every autumn.   

“No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit” (Lk. 6:43), we heard in today’s gospel.  We have all experienced an abundance of the good fruit and good works of this holy monk and dedicated priest, Abbot Brian.  We especially recall his care and concern for us at the most vulnerable moments of our lives.  He was a man marked by unbounded compassion and care for others.  “A bruised reed he will not break and a dimly burning wick he will not quench” (Is. 42:3; RB 64:13). With these same words from the prophet Isaiah, which we heard in our first reading, St. Benedict describes the office of abbot, so well lived out by Abbot Brian. 

“Care of the sick must rank before all else, for in them Christ is truly served,” teaches St. Benedict (RB 36:1).  This charge Abbot Brian took literally.  During his tenure as abbot of this monastery, we built the abbey infirmary so that aged and infirm monks could receive proper care and assistance.  Abbot Brian frequently visited the sick and remained at their side until they breathed their last breath.  Providentially, it was in that infirmary that he himself received the care and attention of our dedicated nurses until he breathed his last.  

Abbot Brian didn’t only see the face of Christ in the sick, he believed the Divine Presence is in everyone and everywhere (RB 19:1).  This was especially evident when, at the very beginning of his tenure as abbot in 1975, a wave of Vietnamese refugees came to America.  We knew them from the news as “boat people.”  Some were Catholics fleeing intense religious persecution; most were Buddhists fleeing an oppressive Communist regime.  That didn’t matter to Abbot Brian—they were refugees in need of help.  His response? He opened the doors of this monastery and convinced many families here and elsewhere to open their homes and hearts as well.  God blessed that generosity—one of those refugees was a Benedictine monk seeking asylum and who remains with us, our Bro. Tarcissius, who worked together with Abbot Brian in our garden and orchard for more than forty years.  In 1980, the United Stated Bishops’ Conference awarded Abbot Brian the Humanitarian Award for his work with Vietnamese refugees.  This is what it means to see the face of Christ in those in need!  

When Delbarton School began its relationship with Operation Smile, an NGO of the United Nations that provides medical care for the poor all around the world, Abbot Brian was the first on the faculty to go with three Delbarton students on an Operation Smile mission to the Gaza Strip.  Tensions between Palestinians and Israelis were great.  Immediately prior to this mission, the Palestinian Liberation Army leader, Yasser Arafat, received the Nobel Prize for Peace.  Upon their arrival in the Gaza Strip, the entire medical team was invited to meet the Nobel laureate, including the three Delbarton students and Abbot Brian. 

Enroute from Bethlehem back to their hotel in Jerusalem, the Delbarton four found themselves without a driver.  Abbot Brian quickly solved that problem and hired a driver for the short six-mile trip from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. But just a mile or two down the road, the driver stopped, got out of the car and opened the trunk.  Everyone thought the worst: we’re going die!  He’s got a gun?  Instead, the driver pulled a rug from his trunk, placed it on the ground, and knelt down in prayer facing Mecca.  Abbot Brian joined that prayer, and I’m sure a prayer of thanksgiving that God provided a good man of the Muslim faith to safely escort the Delbarton four back to their hotel. 

Muslim?  Buddhist?  Jewish?  Christian?  Catholic?  For Abbot Brian, everyone is made in the image and likeness of God.  Therefore, everyone deserves respect!  Heck, he even invited his Jewish neighbors in Newark to his first Mass 61 years ago.  Yes, like Abbot Brian, we believe that Divine Presence is in everyone, shining through human weakness!  This is our faith!  This is the faith of our fathers!  This is the faith of the Church!  This is the faith of Abbot Brian!  We will be true to thee til’ death!