Judge not, lest ye be-

One can say this about the Kennedys- they can't keep to a schedule.

Senator Ted got buried in the dark, as his brother Robert did 41 years ago. Too much action, too many stops, too little time.

Still, it was, to Waldo at least, in the small points of his prolonged burial- almost as tedious as President Ford's- that the measure of the man lay. Sometimes there are lessons in the deaths of those whose passages are writ large by circumstance.

The media was full of stories people told of constituent service above and beyond the call, with followups and so many drop-ins and phone calls one wonders how he got any work done as a senator. Still, the tales portrayed a public servant more in touch with his constituents on the street than one might have supposed by his playboy lifestyle and decades of vilification by his opponents.

Another was that hundreds of present and former staff members, other congressional colleagues and staff, would gather and wait upon the passage of the senator's casket past the Senate steps was a telling moment. 91-year old Robert Byrd of West Virginia, who has been hospitalized much of this year, was there in a wheelchair. Byrd dealt a blow to Kennedy's Senate leadership chances by snatching the Senate Majority Whip's job from Kennedy in 1971, but such is the nature of the Senate- at least among its older members- that collegiality- the will, as Shakespeare says, to fight as advocates do in law, then eat and drink as friends- triumphs over all else. As the President noted in his eulogy, Senator Kennedy came to the Senate in an era when disagreement did not mean your patriotism was called into question.

For Waldo, the most telling point of the entire long weekend was the reading, at the graveside, of correspondence between Senator Kennedy and the Pope. We are all pretty much equal before death- except for the end of life care we get-, and, while it is true that most of us would not get the President to hand-carry a letter to the Pope, what is striking about the Senator's letter is its penitent spirit. It is the letter of a man who knew his time on earth was measured in days:

“Most Holy Father,

I asked President Obama to personally hand deliver this letter to you. As a man of deep faith himself, he understands how important my Roman Catholic faith is to me and I am so deeply grateful to him.

I hope this letter finds you in good health. I pray that you have all of God’s blessings as you lead our church and inspire our world during challenging times.

I am writing with deep humility to ask that you pray for me as my own health declines. I was diagnosed with brain cancer over a year ago and although I am undergoing treatment, the disease is taking its toll on me.

I am 77-years-old and preparing for the next passage of life.

I’ve been blessed to be part of a wonderful family and both my parents, specifically my mother, kept our Catholic faith at the center of our lives.

That gift of faith has sustained and nurtured and provided solace to me in the darkest hours. I know that i have been an imperfect human being, but with the help of my faith I have tried to right my past.

I want you to know, your Holiness, that in my 50 years of elected office I have done my best to champion the rights of the poor and open doors of economic opportunity. I’ve worked to welcome the immigrant, to fight discrimination and expand access to health care and education. I’ve opposed the death penalty and fought to end war. Those are the issues that have motivated me and have been the focus of my work as a U.S. Senator.

I also want you to know that even though I am ill, I am committed to do everything I can to achieve access to health care for everyone in my country. This has been the political cause of my life.

I believe in a conscience protection for Catholics in the health field and I’ll continue to advocate for it as my colleagues in the Senate and I work to develop an overall national health policy that guarantees health care for everyone.

I’ve always tried to be a faithful Catholic, Your Holiness. And though I have fallen short through human failings I’ve never failed to believe and respect the fundamental teachings of my faith.

I continue to pray for God’s blessings on you and on our church and would be most thankful for your prayers for me.”

Equally striking is the tone and substance of the Papal reply:

The Holy Father has read the letter in which you entrusted to President Obama, who kindly presented it to him during his recent meeting.

He was saddened to know of your illness and asked me to assure you of his concern and his spiritual closeness. He is particular grateful of your prayers for him and for the needs of our universal church. His Holiness prays that in the days ahead you may be sustained in faith and hope and granted the precious grace of joyful surrender to the will of God, our merciful Father.

He invokes upon you the consolation and peace of our risen savior, to all who share in his sufferings and trust in his promise of eternal life, commending you and the members of your family to the loving intervention of the Blessed Virgin Mary.

The Holy Father cordially imparts his apostolic blessing as a pledge of wisdom, comfort and strength in the Lord.

The exchange is an interesting counterpoint to the commentaries by many on the Catholic Right that the church hierarchy ought to boycott the Senator's funeral, and that the Vatican's public silence meant volumes. The more hateful sorts- we read one correspondent who said the Archbishop's presence at Kennedy's mass would be the senator spitting on the church from the grave- have themselves spat, and we have already noted Savonarola's ad hominem attack featuring a photo of Kennedy as a fat, waddling, old, man- not to mention the sorts who argue he should have done prison time, etc, etc.

Senator Kennedy was deeply flawed man. But at the end of his life he looked into the abyss and asked the head of his faith for a blessing to aid him going forward. He spent the last hours of his life, we are told, in prayer.

What we need to extend to him- as much as to anyone we know, or any member of our family- is Grace. Grace is unearned and undeserved. It is the measure of Christian faith, fully exercised, that we extend it to others, especially when we know what they have done that we don't like. As Robert Frost wrote in a more secular context, "Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to let you in."

Being a good Christian strikes Waldo as being like President Kennedy's reasoning for going to the moon: "We do this, not because it is easy, but because it is hard."

Daniel J. Cassidy demonstrates a version of Christianity that is easy. It's the gossipy, judgmental, easily-offended, grudge-bearing Christianity of a small congregation of small minds. "It's all about me, what do you think about me?" His is a small faith, driven by anger and resentment, and fear, and a confidence, one assumes, that at 77 he doesn't think he will look like a fat, sick, old, man someone will photograph and publish just to shame and demean.

At the end, the famous die like the rest of us. Their loss leaves a family bereaved,and employees without work. We should take all people as a whole and in the certainty that there are those waiting to sit in judgment of all of us.