After reading about Bishop Thomas Paprocki’s new funeral restrictions in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois, I felt compelled to ask a question on X: “What is it about a certain type of Catholic who wants to strip everything human, personal, or emotional from worship and liturgy?”
The ensuing discussion was not reassuring. People explained why they disliked eulogies, described inappropriate remarks they had heard family members deliver, and suggested that grieving families could wait to share their memories of the deceased at the reception lunch after the burial. Those who defended Paprocki’s policies seemed to have little concern about what these restrictions might communicate to people who had just lost a loved one.
Under the policies that took effect July 1, 2026, a visitation or wake in the church on the day of the funeral is prohibited. Words of remembrance about the deceased must be submitted to the pastor at least three days beforehand for approval. Even if approved, they may be read only by a priest or deacon during the funeral rites. Family members may speak at another gathering, such as a meal following the burial, but not immediately before or after any of the Christian funeral rites — the Vigil for the Deceased, the Funeral Liturgy, or the Rite of Committal. In other words, he has banned close family and friends from speaking before, during, and after the wake, the funeral Mass, and the graveside service.
These restrictions go beyond the options provided in the funeral rites approved for the US. Funeral guidelines across the Church make clear that eulogies are not appropriate in the funeral liturgy. The General Instruction of the Roman Missal (GIRM) calls for a brief funeral homily, “but never a eulogy of any kind” (382). But the Order of Christian Funerals explicitly provides that “a member or a friend of the family may speak in remembrance of the deceased before the final commendation begins” (OCF 170). The Archdiocese of Newark’s 2021 policy distinguishes a eulogy, “a speech to praise the deceased,” from words of remembrance, “a reflection on the life of the deceased in the light of faith.” Some dioceses place regulations and suggestions regarding the words of remembrance. Like Springfield, the Archdiocese of Newark requires that the words be prepared and reviewed in advance before they are delivered. Unlike Springfield, however, Newark’s rules state that “the opportunity for a person to speak should not be denied when requested.”
Paprocki goes much further than Newark, pushing all lay reflections outside the rites and prohibiting them immediately before or after. Among his reasons is the concern that even when remarks are suitable, “family members are often overcome with grief and have a hard time getting through their remarks.”
I know something about that. Before my dad’s funeral began, I gave a two-minute reflection. It would have been a couple of minutes longer, but (as you can hear from the audio) I had difficulty holding it together. Listening to it again, it wasn’t the greatest thing ever (a lot of ums, a long pause). But at the time, in the midst of my grief and heartbreak, I wanted to express what kind of man my dad was and what he meant to me.
Would it really have been better if someone had told me I could not say those words myself? If a mourner begins to lose composure, a priest can offer to help, or can be asked to read the reflection. But to mourn is human. People aren’t perfect. I do not understand why the possibility of being overcome with grief should disqualify family members from speaking at a funeral.
Paprocki says he held “extensive discussions with our Presbyteral Council and Diocesan Pastoral Council” before issuing the directives. I wonder whether the result would have been different if the needs of recently bereaved families had carried more weight in those discussions. His concerns, like those of many priests on social media, treat funeral liturgies in terms of trends, patterns, and widespread abuses. But what is repetitive for the priest is often a once-in-a-lifetime event for an ordinary person. Maybe the priest has buried a hundred moms. But you only bury your own mom once. If the priest is rigid and inflexible and the funeral is impersonal, that is what you will remember.
I am certainly not calling for words of remembrance to be mandated. Families have different needs. My brother is a priest, and he celebrated my parents’ and my sister’s funerals. We had words of remembrance at only one of them, my dad’s. At the others, the personal connection was already there in the priest who knew and loved the person he was burying. But sometimes the priest barely knows the deceased, if at all. Sometimes a loved one has something brief and meaningful to say. Why should that family’s funeral be governed by clergy’s negative experiences at other funerals?
I understand the need for limits. During the discussion on X, Mary FioRito quoted concerns from Cardinal Blase Cupich’s funeral guidelines about problems that arise during words of remembrance: hurtful comments, inappropriate humor, and remarks that overshadow the Mass. I share those concerns. But the solution is not to ensure that family members cannot offer their own remembrances during or immediately before or after the Vigil, Mass, and burial.
Yes, the unpredictable or awkward can happen during a funeral reflection. But — believe it or not — even a terrible, long, inappropriate, or off-topic eulogy isn’t the end of the world. Anyone who has been a practicing Catholic for a long time accepts that some priests are mediocre preachers. Typically we muddle through and temper our expectations, often focusing on the priest’s other qualities. And ordination does not guarantee pastoral sensitivity either. I once attended a funeral for a man who had died by suicide, at which the priest suggested that even though he killed himself, hopefully the man was in purgatory — but that he would probably be there for a very long time. A layperson stumbling through a loving remembrance — or even saying the things that make the doctrinally orthodox cringe (“Grandma is an angel in heaven!”) — is hardly the worst thing mourners might hear.
As a Catholic, I understand that our funeral Mass serves a particular purpose: we offer the Eucharist for the dead and commend them to God’s mercy. I am not proposing that we turn Catholic funerals into Protestant memorial services. In fact, I think placing remembrances outside the funeral Mass can be prudent. So why not before? Why not after?
Indeed, some of the practices Paprocki prohibited — such as words of remembrance in the church before the funeral Mass — could provide precisely the opportunity he says he wants. The memorial begins at 10 a.m. Everyone knows they must finish by 10:50 so Mass can begin at 11. The Mass itself can be focused on God, just as Paprocki desires.
His exclusion of lay speakers at the Vigil the night before runs directly against the USCCB’s pastoral guidance. The US bishops’ website says, “It is most appropriate, when family and friends are gathered together for visitation, to offer time for recalling the life of the deceased. For this reason, eulogies are usually encouraged to be done at the funeral home during visitation or at the Vigil Service.”
A few years ago, I attended a Vigil in a church for a woman who had lived to be nearly a hundred. She was the matriarch of a large Catholic family, with many children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren — many of whom are friends from church. Five people spoke from the ambo, including two of her grandchildren and her longtime parish priest, and much of what they said was about her faith. This was a deeply pious family remembering a woman they loved — a woman I had barely met but whose descendants reflected her example of Christian witness. I struggle to understand an approach that sees a gathering like that as something to restrict out of some debatable liturgical principle.
Instead, Paprocki insists personal reflections may only take place at other gatherings, such as a meal after the burial. But that assumes there is a suitable gathering and that the people who came to the funeral can attend it. In my experience, friends and coworkers often take time off work for the Mass and then need to leave.
Behind the argument over where to put those few minutes, however, is a deeper disagreement about the liturgy and the people who celebrate it. Some Catholics seem to regard ordinary warmth and personal connection as concessions to people who do not really understand worship, as though removing these things leaves us with something purer and more holy. I do not understand why being normal, friendly, and vulnerable should be treated as a threat to reverence.
Perhaps some of this is temperament. I am an expressive person. Others are more private and reserved. None of us should assume that our own preference is the answer to everyone else’s grief. Nor does being reserved eliminate the human element — a priest’s tone and manner still send a message. Pope Francis recognized this in Desiderio desideravi, listing both “a superabundant friendliness” and “priestly impassibility” among inadequate ways of presiding (54). A celebrant can impose himself on the liturgy through either extreme.
Paprocki knows that a bishop’s decisions carry real consequences in the spiritual lives of the faithful. When Pope Francis restricted the older form of the Mass through Traditionis Custodes, Paprocki granted dispensations for two parish churches, citing the spiritual good of the faithful, and later designated Sacred Heart a non-parochial church for the 1962 Missal. I wish that same imagination were more evident when those affected by his decisions are grieving families.
In a secularizing culture, funerals are among the few remaining occasions when many people encounter the Church at all. The GIRM notes this in its section on funerals: pastors should “take into special account those who are present … and who may be non-Catholics or Catholics who never or rarely participate in the Eucharist or who seem even to have lost the faith. For priests are ministers of Christ’s Gospel for all” (385).
As a priest friend told me, “As with weddings, we are dealing with people who are largely unchurched, and they don’t need someone throwing the book at them in their time of need.” The parish or diocese can instead focus on pastoral accompaniment. They can prepare formation materials and explain what is appropriate. The family member can be instructed that their words should be limited to three or four minutes. As this experienced pastor noted, “I have found that most people can do a good job when you give them decent, patient instructions.”
For the sake of clarity: if I were a priest in Springfield, I would follow Paprocki’s norms, and I would advise Catholics there to do the same. His rules are unwise, not invalid. But a bishop’s authority does not settle the question of whether he has used it well, and we cannot talk seriously about evangelization while dismissing the ordinary human encounters through which people come to know the Church. The family before the priest may need guidance. Their remembrance may be imperfect. But they have come to the Church with their grief, and our response should help them recognize the love of Christ.
Liturgy is a reflection of Catholic culture. When people experience it as rigid and institutional, that tells them something about the Church. Closing off pastoral options that the Church’s funeral rites provide undermines the notion that the Church is, as Pope Francis described it, a field hospital for sinners. If mourners experience the Church as an unfeeling institution that makes rules and bosses people around, we have given them another obstacle to hearing the Gospel. Somebody’s funeral is not the place to begin laying down the liturgical hammer.
Image: Adobe Stock. by AnnaStills.
Mike Lewis is the founding managing editor of Where Peter Is. In addition to his work for the site, his writing has appeared in America Magazine, National Catholic Reporter, US Catholic, The Irish Catholic, Catholic Outlook, The Synodal Times, and other Catholic publications. He has been quoted in The Washington Post, Vanity Fair, The New York Post, and other mainstream outlets on Catholic affairs. He previously co-hosted the Field Hospital podcast with Jeannie Gaffigan and The Debrief podcast. Before founding Where Peter Is, he worked in communications at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and Catholic Climate Covenant. He is married with four children.
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