Val Fuller

At funerals, we do the math, don’t we? Val would have been 73 in April. So young.                                                                                       And yet . . . .

Blessed is she who feeds the five thousand; blessed is she who clothes the naked, even be they infants; she who holds all children as sacred; she who cultivates the soil and makes a garden beautiful to behold; she who at dawn prunes greenery for its well-being; she whose joy bursts forth in song; she who welcomes strangers; she who reaches down to pull a man from the mire and takes him as a husband; she who is a mother and a paragon of motherhood; she who is innocently canonized by a grandchild within hours of her death and named Saint Nana. 

Blessed is she who many times dresses the Altar of Repose at St. Paul’s Co-Cathedral that her Saviour might have a place of honour in anticipation of the Resurrection; blessed is she who so loves Christmas that she loses thousands of hours of sleep to magnify the Wonder of His Birth. 

Blessed is she who lives the strict discipline of letting no suffering be wasted; blessed is she who guides her beloved ones to understand that God will never be outdone in generosity; she who home-schools her children and teaches them the value of redemptive sacrifice by embracing dementia and Alzheimer’s as an offering for the sake of her family’s Salvation. 

Her sister, Roxanne, and her brothers, Lex and Jeff, are blessed in her. 

Her husband, Guy, is blessed in her; her children Lauren, Sarah, Elizabeth, Michael, Brigid, and David are blessed in her; Lauren’s daughter Gabrielle and Gabrielle’s husband Isaac; Sarah’s husband Jason and their children Winston and Gemma; Elizabeth’s husband Matthew and their children Jude, Kit, and Lewis; Michael’s wife Kim and their sons Henry and Beau; Brigid’s husband Mark; David’s wife Melissa—all these are blessed in her. Val’s sister-in-Christ, Dorothy, is blessed in her. As are her friends, too numerous to record. 

Especially blessed in these last nearly six years are the Sisters of St. Joseph, and the lay Staff at St. Joseph’s Home, Saskatoon; please, in lieu of flowers, bless the Sisters and the Home with a donation to support the care of the aged and infirm. 

A Vigil will be prayed for Val at St. Mary’s Church (211 Avenue O, South) on Monday, January 26 at 7:00 pm. Val’s funeral Mass will be celebrated at St. Mary’s on Tuesday, January 27, at 11:00 am. 

Blessed, oh blessed, is our dear Val who, (to be mathematically correct) at 72 years, 9 months, leaves us far too soon. But also just in time to have given us everything we need to live without her. Blessed is our God, who will never be outdone in generosity.