My mother loved to go to wakes and funerals. She would sit in O’Brien’s and Sweeney’s funeral homes in Bayonne, NJ for hours at a wake taking in who came to pay their respects and talking with them.. She told me once she was needed there because she knew all the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary and could recite it when the time came. I also remember her complaint when O’Brien’s shortened the hours for visitation.

But the Tree of Jesse reminds me of something else. She had a remarkable memory for relationships and loved to trace peoples’ family connections. She would be at home with Matthew and Luke tracing the ancestry of Jesus in their gospels. She wasn’t a professional genealogist, she plied her gift at wakes and funerals.

I find myself at funerals doing the same thing. Some time ago, I recognized a young man who came from a family friendly with mine from years ago and I told him my mother and father met at his grandmother’s house at a celebration after a baptism–maybe it was his father’s baptism. My mother was washing the dishes.

He was delighted to hear that little story, a connection enlarging his family tree.

The Tree of Jesse, the Christmas Tree, the Family Tree. Connections are important. We need them.