Leyland, 30 June 2011 (Abbot Cuthbert Madden OSB)
Dear Brethren, Parishioners, Friends,
We have gathered here today to give thanks to God for the life of Bishop Ambrose and to ask the Lord to forgive him his sins and to welcome him into eternal life.
Michael Ambrose Griffiths was blessed by a long and very active life of just over 82 years. I first met him in 1982 when I asked to join the community at Ampleforth. By that time Abbot Ambrose had already been educated in the College, studied Chemistry at Balliol College, Oxford, discerned a vocation to the monastic life and returned to the monastery. He had served the community in a variety of different roles: as teacher of boys – this was long before we had taken girls at Ampleforth – as a teacher of monks; as the Procurator, which is the name we give to the monk who manages all the financial aspects of the community’s life; before being elected as abbot in succession to Abbot Basil when he was taken from us to go to Westminster.
My experience of Abbot Ambrose at this time suggested that he was both a careful man and a great source of encouragement. He was careful to ask me all the necessary questions before taking my request to the Council: I was, after all, an unknown quantity – a boy from the local comprehensive who had gone on to be a doctor. But at that time I could not understand why I was asking to join a monastery and that is where the encouragement came to the fore: it was from Ambrose that I learnt that sometimes when God is acting you do not have to understand, you simply need to hear and obey the call which has been addressed to you. By the time I came to the monastery Abbot Patrick had been elected and Abbot Ambrose was working here in Leyland.
A little later I started to get to know him again and I then discovered how happy he had been here in this parish: it was a very important place for him. Here at Leyland the monk-priest flourished. He loved the round of services which punctuated the lives of his parishioners. Most of all he loved the people here: you were all very important to him and to the development of his vision of the spiritual life.
I think that we see something of that vision in the readings he has chosen for us at his funeral Mass here in Leyland. Let me begin with the Gospel. There are two important themes in this Gospel which you and I need to take to heart. First of all we hear the words, “May they all be one. Father, may they be one in us, as you are in me and I am in you, so that the world may believe it was you who sent me” (Jn 17.21). Ambrose really believed in unity. As Christian men and women we are all called to be builders of unity; unity at every level. We are called to build unity within our families: easier said than done often enough but such a blessing when the unity exists. We are called to build unity within our parish communities, unity in our monastic community, unity within our diocese; and, needless to say we are called to build unity between the different Christian churches. This unity is important because it underlines the reality of our faith: we build unity so that the world may come to know and love Jesus Christ. When we live the Gospel way of life the words we use flow directly from Jesus and our words encourage others to immerse themselves in their turn in the sacred scriptures so that they can hear Jesus addressing them just as he has addressed us.
The second thing we need to notice in this gospel passage comes towards the end. Jesus says, “I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, so that they may always see the glory you have given me because you loved me” (Jn 17.24). This passage in St John’s Gospel was spoken in the closing hours before Jesus was crucified. These are words which were spoken doubtless to be an encouragement first of all to the apostles and now, later in history, for you and me. Our prayer is that our brother Ambrose is now standing in the presence of the Blessed Trinity: in the presence of God the Almighty Father; in the presence of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord who took flesh in order that the love of the Father for each one of us might be made manifest to us; in the presence of the Spirit, the life giver, who brings the gifts of the Father and Son to us during our life on earth. We know that the moment will come when we are called from this world to the Father: let us make these words of Jesus our own; let us pray daily that we may be admitted into the presence of God and his saints so that we can share in the glory which Christ has promised us.
Lastly I would ask that we recall again one short phrase from the first reading from St Paul’s letter to the Ephesians which seems to me to be at the root of Bishop Ambrose’s optimistic outlook on life, “Glory be to him whose power working in us, can do infinitely more than we can ask or imagine; glory be to him from generation to generation in the Church and in Christ Jesus for ever and ever. Amen.” (Eph 3.20-21) Many of us here received the great blessing of being able to talk with our brother in his closing days. I will not speak of what he said to me in any detail save only to assert that this passage was the foundation of what he had to say. I suspect that in different ways he would want to say the same to all of us. His dying message it seems to me was very simple: “Do not be afraid. Trust wholeheartedly in God, in his providence and in his gifts. Do not be afraid of what the future seems to hold, of the dark clouds on the horizon or even the dark clouds close at hand. Trust always in God. His power to bring good out of evil, good out of difficulties, good out of every situation we encounter, exceeds everything we fear.”
Dear brothers and sisters, we already miss the earthly presence of our brother Ambrose – and that feeling will not depart from us quickly. At the same time, however, he has left us a tremendous gift in the passages of scripture he gave us to pray with at his funeral Mass. I invite you to take these passages of the sacred scripture home with you and make them your own so that all of us may find the consolation and hope for the future which is being offered to us.