Read the main article, “Black men I've mourned.”
Each time I do a funeral, I make some simple concessions before arriving at the church.
The sermon will be 20 minutes or less. Religious services, in general, meet with resistance. Nobody wants them to go on forever. And a funeral is a challenging time for those in attendance. It is not the time to showcase my homiletical skills, exegetical deftness, or poetic flare. The funeral is about God and the deceased. I concede that I will not be able to capture the full picture of someone’s life in 20 minutes. The funeral service is but a piece of a very long day of emotional drain. So I try to be respectful of people’s time.
