We\u2019ve known for a long time that some funny things go on at funerals, and some of the funniest are the musical choices. When I was ordained \u2013 just after the Norman Conquest \u2013 the favourites were such as O God our help in ages past and Abide with me. But in a survey published a couple of weeks ago, these stalwarts were shown to have been supplanted by a pop version of Bohemian Rhapsody and Freddie Mercury\u2019s These are the days of our lives. Other popular choices were Robbie Williams\u2019 Angels and the anthem of the Liverpool Kop You\u2019ll never walk alone.<\/p>\n
Though I can\u2019t imagine why any Christian should request John Lennon\u2019s nihilistic doggerel which goes:<\/p>\n
Imagine there\u2019s no heaven<\/p>\n
It\u2019s easy if you try,<\/p>\n
No hell below us<\/p>\n
Above us only sky<\/p>\n
Imagine all the people living for today<\/p>\n
That recent survey revealed that many \u2013 \u201cmourners\u201d doesn\u2019t seem the right word somehow \u2013 want \u201csomething to make us giggle\u201d when we are saying good bye \u2013 or hopefully au revoir \u2013 to our loved ones. An old lady in the parish of St Mary, Oldham, where I was once curate, asked for George Formby\u2019s When I\u2019m cleaning windows and a colleague told me of someone else who had If I knew you were coming I\u2019d have baked a cake. So that\u2019s what the messianic banquet is all about, is it?<\/p>\n
I recall one particularly hilarious apocalypse at the crematorium \u2013 I\u2019d better not say which crematorium in order to protect the innocent. I was warned that when you pushed the button at the end of the service there would be a nasty surprise. The mechanism was old and crabby. I pushed the button for the coffin to start its mechanical journey through the curtains and into the beyond. There was a great CHUNG! And everyone looked up, startled. But that little disturbance was only for starters\u2026<\/p>\n
The coffin was supposed to pass through the curtains and on to a trolley placed in the anteroom by the two cheerful necrophiles who acted as vergers. Supposed to. Only this time they had forgotten.<\/p>\n
So off goes Uncle Fred through the crack of doom. And suddenly there\u2019s an almighty CRASH! Followed by the loud utterance of two words from what I suppose we must call the other side \u2013 the second word was hell! The first word is altogether unmentionable! The congregation were paralysed, no doubt thinking that those two words were Uncle Fred\u2019s first disapproving comments on the life of the world to come. I went behind. What a scene: imagine the dead Scrooge in his nightshirt, the vergers\u2019 copy of The Sun having fallen across his face.<\/p>\n