We mourn the passing of Gabriel Moran on October 15 of 2021. A full obituary was published in the New York Times, and Kieran Scott offered this graveside reflection:
Friends, Sisters, Brothers and Colleagues,
It is good for us to be here.We have been privileged and honored, to be included in “the great cloud of witnesses,” that have accompanied Gabriel in life and now in his death.
We have been deeply blessed to live life in his presence.
He has left an indelible mark on all our lives.Gabriel was our godly teacher. He has shown us how to live life with integrity (in so many ways), and now he has shown us how to die…with faithfulness.
We may never witness the like of him again in our lifetime. He was one of a kind.
He has shown us how to live uniquely into the fullness of life.
Gabriel was a compassionate humanist, a contemplative, a daily mystic. His guiding light was: all is sacramental.
He was a living sacrament to us.What more can be said? We are left nearly speechless… in deep silence.
And, yet, Gabriel would insist: we need to use words, human language.As our wise teacher, he shows us how to use the miracle of language in all its depth and breath. He taught us the history and geography of some of the key words in our human civilization.
We now stop – in-our tracks – when we see (on a page) or hear (in a speech) the words:
Responsibility, uniqueness, America, teaching, religious, education, adulthood, and of course, Revelation.He revealed to us how these words (in all their depth and breath) are what makes us uniquely human.
A few weeks before Gabriel died, I had a phone conversation with him about a passage in his last book. I asked for some clarification – i.e. if he was up-to-it?
Oh, was he up to it! He came alive! His brilliant mind was still alert and crystal clear.
After simply and profoundly attending to my inquiry, I said to him:
“Gabe, you are very, very orthodox – you are and have always been a correct believer.”He chuckled, and we laughed knowingly together-
how true it was.As our teacher(of wisdom), he showed us how to be traditional – honoring the best of what has gone before us and discarding what has become stale and antiquated.
He reached down deep into our tradition to retrieve its richest wisdom so as to refashion and reshape it in light of our human experience.Hemingway wrote: “Courage is grace under pressure “.
Gabriel exemplified that courage all his life.So, on this very sad occasion, we deeply mourn his passing with Mary, his sister, his nieces and nephews, his extended family, his close friends and all his DeLaSalle brothers.
We pray and trust that in his death “a terrible beauty is born,” and
that his spirit will unite with the Great Spirit and the spirit of his beloved Maria.So, as we lay his mortal body to rest, may his spirit be resurrected and incarnated in our bodily and communal lives.
Together we trust and believe his presence will not end with his death.