The Boston Channel offers details on Sen. Ted Kennedy’s last hours and his Catholic faith.
“It was a total surprise to me to see another world he was involved in – the spiritual world,” said Rev. Patrick Tarrant of Our Lady of Victory Church.
Tarrant, who was called to Kennedy’s bedside late Tuesday as the senator was dying, said it was clear that Kennedy was ready for the journey that awaited him. He described the senator as “a man of quiet prayer” in his last hours.
“The truth is, he had expressed to his family that he did want to go. He did want to go to heaven. He did want to die and he did want to go. He was ready to go. There was a certain amount peace – a lot of peace, actually – in the family get-together last night. I couldn’t help but think that the world doesn’t know that part of the senator at all,” Tarrant said in a lilting Irish brogue.
Tarrant told the news channel that the priest saw a more personal side that was deeply devout and the “secret” of Kennedy’s power.
“I think the whole world knows certain parts very well, but I think there’s another part of his life that very few people know, and that’s his deep faith. His very deep faith in God and his love for his family,” Tarrant said.
The Boston Globe has more details on the funeral arragements:
Senator Edward M. Kennedy will lie in repose at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum before his funeral at a historic Boston church where he prayed daily while his daughter successfully battled her own cancer. Kennedy will then be buried at Arlington National Cemetery next to his brothers.
Kennedy’s funeral is being planned for the Our Lady of Perpetual Help Basilica in the Mission Hill section of Boston. Commonly known as the Mission Church, the 1,300-seat basilica on Tremont Street was built in the 1870s. Kennedy prayed there in 2003 while his daughter, Kara, overcame lung cancer.
