Ed's Memorial Service Bulletin

    Memorial Service for

  Edwin Alexander Crosbie

 
Memorial Service for Edwin Alexander Crosbie

Piano Prelude Music

Welcome: Reverend Laurie Bushbaum

On behalf of the Crosbie family, welcome, and thank you for being here to celebrate the life of Edwin Alexander Crosbie.  A poet wrote:

“The music of the spheres.  A Harmonious universe- like a harp.

It’s rhythms are the equal, repeated seasons.  The beating of the heart.

Day/ night.  The going and returning of migratory birds.

The cycle of stars and corn.

The mimosa that unfolds by day and  folds up again by night.

Rhythms of moon and tide.

One single rhythm in planets, atoms and sea,

And apples that ripen and fall and in the mind of Newton.

Melody, accord, arpeggios / The harp of the universe.

Unity behind apparent multiplicity,

That is the music.”

        It is the music of Edwin Crosbie’s life which has brought us together this afternoon.  With his death, the music is quieter, but we can still hear it in our memories, beating in our own hearts, and in the pattern of the life he lived.

We are all, indeed, part of God’s great symphony, containing the scores for both life and death.  We enter in to this life a mystery and leave it in a mystery.  In the middle, we are upheld by a powerful music we do not fully comprehend.          We gather this afternoon in both sorrow and thankfulness.  We gather in sorrow because our lives are forever changed with the passing of Edwin Alexander Crosbie.  We gather in gratitude to hold dear all that he has been to you. 

Prayer:  O Holy One - creator of both life  and death, fill us with the trust that all that life brings to us, we shall have the capacity to meet.  And if we are empty of that trust, help us to seek it out in the steadying hands of others while we wait for it to come.   Help us to affirm the glories and beauties of life despite the lonlines and darkness of death.

Let the knowledge of death carve in us deeper compassion for all beings that live and die.  May we feel your loving power resting in us now - in the grand turning of the seasons  - in the stars arched over us at night, in the love of family and friends.  Though these gathered here today are touched by the pain of death, may they be comforted by the glory of Your Creation.  I pray simply that with each day the pain lessens and their hearts and spirits turn again around the circle of life and behold its music.   Amen.

Candle Lighting:  Each life is a light in the world; today we celebrate Ed’s light.  Love and faith and knowledge are passed from generation to generation.  Steve and brother Richard will light the first two candles, pass the flames to the next generation (Benjamin and Jenaveve), and then on to the great grandchildren (Hannah and Samuel).

Hymn:  “The Lone, Wild Bird”

You will hear from Steve Crosbie in his eulogy for his father, that Ed was raised Presbyterian and later in life became a Unitarian Universalist.  I too, was raised Presbyterian and later became a UU. And one of my favorite Presbyterian hymns that I sang as a teenager, is also in the UU hymnbook.   Beth Crosbie, married to Edwin’s grandson Ben and her family are Presbyterian.  So let us all sing together this beautiful hymn, “The Lone Wild Bird” which reminds us that we are all held in the great and loving Spirit of  God.

Eulogy – presented by Steve

Musical Interlude- 
Ed Crosbie, piano and vocals

Invitation to others to speak: ……

(See Bethany's and Sue's Remembrances)

Closing Words:  Steve told me how much his father loved life and how hard he fought these last years to stay alive and to continue to enjoy life.  Yet, all of us must surrender to death at some point..The poet Mary Oliver writes:

To live in this world / you must be able /to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it / against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and, when the time comes to let it go,

to let it go.

As you let go of the mortal life of Edwin Crosbie, may his life continue to sing in your heart.  Trust that though he is gone from our sight he is resting gracefully in the Great Spirit.

Hymn:  “Amazing Grace” – One of Ed’s favorite hymns.

Reading: “To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion; to be worthy, not respectable and wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think quietly talk gently, act frankly, to listen to the stars and birds to babes and sages, with open heart; to bear all cheerfully; do all bravely, await occasions, hurry never.  In a word to let the spiritual, unbidden and unconscious, grow up through the common”.

This is to be my symphony.   William Henry Channing

Benediction: May the music of God’s creation bring you hope and joy today and each day to come. May you turn to those you love with kindness and compassion.  Go forth in peace, knowing that you rest in God’s presence and God rests in you.  Amen.