Sammy died. He was 76. I spent about an hour in the widow's home meeting the family, giving support and trying to help make all the necessary arrangements. The family members consider me to be their minister even though none are Christians, none go to Church and they say the whole religious thing is not for them. Still when death visits I'm the first person they call.
That's not a complaint or a criticism, just an observation.
Outside the house a furtive-looking man approached me with some hesitation. I didn't recognise him as a family. He looked to be about the age that Sammy was.
“Reverend,” he said in a loud, hoarse, smoker's whisper. There was something conspiratorial about his manner as he looked around as if to make sure that he wasn't being overheard.
“Excuse me Reverend, but we were wondering if you would do the funeral in the buff”.
This didn't sound like a request. It was more like a statement of what was expected, but whose the expectation was and what the consequences would be if I declined were unknown: the family were well-known as paramilitary activists. Bullets in the knee caps were the order of the day, and Sammy hadn't been averse to sanctioning such activities.
I was quite thrown. The crowd gathering around me was growing and it looked threatening, even though I knew a lot of the people quite well and had sat with most of them through many difficult personal situations. The man was waiting for a response. Several reactions ran about my mind.
The first that I didn't voice aloud was “It's January”.
The second, still unvoiced, was “Would we all be in the buff or just me?”
The third was “No.” That too went unspoken.
After a while my unease and discomfiture lifted. It dawned on my troubled mind that what the man wanted to know was whether I would conduct the funeral according to the practices of the Royal Ancient Order of Buffaloes, the local drinking club.
I muttered something about that being a family matter and agreed that after I had completed the Christian part of the service it was up to Sammy's family to act as they saw fit.
It snowed heavily on the day of the funeral: perhaps my lily white skin would have blended in unnoticed along with the snowflakes, my hair and my Bible lending the only smudges of colour to the scene. It was bitterly cold, so I wrapped it all up as quickly as I could, not wanting the family to get frozen, but still wanting to do Sammy justice. I had to concentrate so as not to snigger at the vision of me officiating in the bleak graveyard clad only in a clerical collar with snow swirling around my shrivelled bits, and as I moved off to the shelter of my car Sammy's friends gathered round the grave to say farewell after the practice of the Buffaloes.
I never did get to find out what their practices were.
