Audio Recording
"A Sermon for Kevin Redrico (1993-2017)"
by Deacon Dennis Purificacion (Homily #88)
St. Catherine's Catholic Church, Vallejo, CA
Friday, May 12, 2017, 7:30pm
[homily text below includes video-links of Kevin]
"A Sermon for Kevin Redrico (1993-2017)"
by Deacon Dennis Purificacion (Homily #88)
St. Catherine's Catholic Church, Vallejo, CA
Friday, May 12, 2017, 7:30pm
[homily text below includes video-links of Kevin]
To Jonathan and the Alberto and Redrico Families, we
as a community express our deepest condolences and our support during this
difficult time of loss.
To our visitors who have travelled from near or far
away, or to those who could not be present, or to those listening to this homily
online, we warmly welcome you, and to those not of Kevin’s spiritual tradition,
we especially welcome you today here at St. Catherine's Church.
To first responders and volunteer search and rescue
teams, we say thank you.
If you and I look around St. Catherine’s Church and Kevin’s hometown of Vallejo, we will see a snapshot of Kevin’s roots – the walls, the pews, the choir section, the piano where Kevin played for Mass, the Catholic Youth Ministry program where he served as Musical Director about 3 years ago, the schools he went to here, the people and his community – young roots, the same images that Kevin saw growing up, images which eventually were part of Kevin budding into a gifted artist and into a young man. This evening and tomorrow, you and I will hear of these many gifts. This evening, we reflect on the Word of God to guide us and to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for the repose of Kevin's soul and for the consolation of his family.
(from TFCBalitangAmerica Channel)
If you and I look around St. Catherine’s Church and Kevin’s hometown of Vallejo, we will see a snapshot of Kevin’s roots – the walls, the pews, the choir section, the piano where Kevin played for Mass, the Catholic Youth Ministry program where he served as Musical Director about 3 years ago, the schools he went to here, the people and his community – young roots, the same images that Kevin saw growing up, images which eventually were part of Kevin budding into a gifted artist and into a young man. This evening and tomorrow, you and I will hear of these many gifts. This evening, we reflect on the Word of God to guide us and to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass for the repose of Kevin's soul and for the consolation of his family.
And through the gift that God gave to us with Kevin’s voice and Kevin himself, there are 2 main points that I will preach in this sermon for Kevin Redrico today to set the tone for the weekend. I’d like to take some songs that Kevin played and sang with relate them to the Scriptural passages the family selected from the Word of God, the Word of God which consoles us.
In this earthly life, Kevin sang for us; now, let us
sing for his soul through prayer at [this Catholic Funeral Mass] this evening.
I
The first song came from his roots at St. Patrick-St.
Vincent High School here in Vallejo which Kevin attended. (In fact, there are St. Pat’s teachers here
who knew Kevin, like Ian Emperador, Myra Nati, and Prof.
Kristi "Ms. J." Juliani, and others. I
myself was a teacher at St. Pat’s, and I’m sure Kevin would have been one of my
students had I continued teaching there.)
And during his freshman year, in a production Ms. J.
directed with the Men’s Choir, with Kevin on piano and his friends like Taylor Liff on guitar (video HERE @ 05:25). They got together and played a song by Bryan Adams “Everything I Do, I Do It For
You.” Little did Kevin know those many
years ago that we would recall this song to reflect our love for him:
Look
into my eyes / You will see / what you mean to me /
Search
your heart / Search your soul / When you find me, then you’ll search no more.
Don't tell me it’s not worth trying for / You can’t tell
me it’s not worth dying for /
You know its true / everything I do, I do it for you.
“Search your heart.
Search your soul. … Everything I
do, I do it for you.”
Not only was Kevin devoted to family and friends and
his love of music, but this is a reflection of our own love – this community’s love
– for him, a community that came together, with Jonathan at the helm guiding
us, during tragedy and said, “Everything I do, Kevin, I do it for you.”
And that is one of the purposes of our gathering today. To search our heart and to search our
soul. And to pray (as Father said at the beginning of Mass). As we see in the Gospel today, “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You have faith in God; have faith also in
me,” Jesus said. Jesus’s words are
like Kevin’s dream team San Fran6, singing an a Capella song, “I Can’t Feel My Face” by
The Weeknd:
She told me, don't worry about it /
She told me, don't worry no more /
We both know we can't go without it…
She told me, don't worry no more /
We both know we can't go without it…
[She told me you’ll never be in love…oh, oh, woo..]
Jesus said he goes to prepare a place in his Fathers house, so we "don’t worry about it."
Jesus goes
to prepare a place for us. So “don’t
worry no more…” We don’t worry no more
because, as St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians
says, “Christ has been raised from
the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.” In other words, don’t be afraid, don’t worry
no more, because Jesus’s passion, death and Resurrection has been won for us
already! (At the end of time, when Jesus
returns, we too will be resurrected.)
We have faith in the kindness and mercy of the Risen Jesus
Christ, as it is written in the Responsorial Psalm, “The Lord is kind and merciful” (and "The Lord is my Shepherd; there is nothing I shall want."
And it is this mercy that we ask of God Almighty today. Just as we limited and weak human beings do everything for those we
love, so it all the more so that Almighty God, who has gifted Kevin, bestow His
love, kindness and mercy upon us. That’s what we ask for in prayer [at Kevin's Catholic Funeral Liturgy] this evening.
The same Jesus who Kevin received in the waters of
Baptism, the same who Kevin received Holy Communion at Mass at this very church, the same Jesus who rose from the dead at Easter, says to us, “I am the way and the truth
and the life. No one comes to the
Father except through me.” Let
Kevin’s passing be an invitation to those of us who have not thought about
Jesus as the only way to God to look into Jesus who Kevin served and followed,
that Jesus is more than just a carpenter-teacher or just a guru or just a man
or just someone among the other world religions--- Jesus is the only Savior of
the world. Just as Kevin’s earthly
father introduced Kevin to music at age 3, so too our loving Heavenly Father
introduced Kevin to the music that is Jesus’ love and mercy. “Look into your heart… when you
find me there," Jesus says, "You’ll search no more.” (And that's the first main point: Let Kevin's passing be a reason for us to look to Jesus' words and his very person.) Jesus, king of mercy, we entrust Kevin to you.
II
Finally, before I take the final song that Kevin sung
or played, we say thank you once again to the Alberto and Redrico families, to
Jonathan, for sharing him with the community today, for inspiring us with his life, and calling
us to love him in the final days of his earthly life.
Now, in the days and months and years ahead, especially when you hear Kevin’s voice from old videos or see his photos, let the love and kindness of our merciful Heavenly Father fill your hearts with grace for Kevin. It’s like the song Kevin helped produce called “Still” by Brian Eichenburger and which he sang with Ms. J. as director. It also involved now-Dr. Stephanie Quan and Andrew Kahrimanian [video by Camille Kahrimanian HERE] who were also my former students at St. Pat’s:
Now, in the days and months and years ahead, especially when you hear Kevin’s voice from old videos or see his photos, let the love and kindness of our merciful Heavenly Father fill your hearts with grace for Kevin. It’s like the song Kevin helped produce called “Still” by Brian Eichenburger and which he sang with Ms. J. as director. It also involved now-Dr. Stephanie Quan and Andrew Kahrimanian [video by Camille Kahrimanian HERE] who were also my former students at St. Pat’s:
I
found a photograph of you and me with our old California friends. /
A frozen picture of what used to be, way back
when. /
Still our star light fills the sky…still our candle holds a fire… /
You’re gonna miss me when I’m gone; you’re
gonna miss me when I’m gone.
 |
| (photo courtesy of Andrew Kahrimanian who is on Kevin's right) |
And so when, in those quiet moments, when your heart
cries, "I miss him," turn to the hope of Heaven. Have Holy Mass offered for him— for there is no higher prayer of a Christian
than that of the Holy Mass.
And remember these words
from Kevin himself—words that bring him back to his childhood and his
roots-- words, in a sense, that reflect the resurrection at the end of time, a resurrection which we proclaim even in the midst of tragedy.
In a video that Kevin recorded of him and Vivian Bayubay
(McLaughlin) from the popular TV children's show “Out of the Box,” Kevin sang the
Ending Theme with Vivian, a video which had about 1.7 million views (video HERE: https://www.facebook.com/kredrico/videos/10153978886168199/). Kevin called her a childhood hero. This was the song that they sang together:
So long, farewell, to you my friends! / Goodbye, for now, until we meet again.
“Until
we meet again…” That’s
right, Kevin, you learned your Catechism.
Until we meet again with the hope of the resurrection, when we will rise
again with Christ, the first-fruits of the resurrection as (we heard proclaimed this evening in the Book of Revelation) the New Jerusalem.
Goodbye, for now, brother, goodbye for now….. until we
meet again.
************
POST-SCRIPT
(Added on Feb. 7, 2018)
 |
| For Christmas 2017, the Redrico Family mailed me a pleasant Christmas letter. |
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