Today I took part in the Requiem Mass, in St Chad's Cathedral, Birmingham, for Archbishop Maurice Couve de Murville. He was a good friend to me since our first meeting in 1982. He was great Bishop of our era, unassuming but very affable and cultured. Hospitality and sociability were his hallmarks as a priest and a bishop. It is probably quite unusual to have a friend who is a bishop but he was so easy to approach and converse with that friendship with him was something that happened so easily. His funeral Mass was very beautiful and it was a privilage to have been a concelebrant. It was a great privilage for me to have known him; his death seems to have happened all too soon after his retirement only seven years ago. May he enter quickly into the Father's House. I will miss him.
2 comments:
I have just seen this, Father. Thank you for posting it.
As a layman of the diocese, it was my privilege on a couple of occasions to mix liturgically and socially with the late archbishop at/after Parish events. He was, indeed, a great priest and bishop -affable and unassuming; a great raconteur. He was, perhaps, not as greatly appreciated as he deserved to have been. Driving past the Cathedral after the Requiem, I was able to take the opportunity to pay my respects as his coffin lay in the hearse. Requiescat in pace.
I do hope that history is kinder to him than the past has been. He was a good man and one of the kindest priests i've ever had the pleasure to meet. RIP
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