By John B Monteiro

Mangaluru, Oct 5: Fr Ravi Santosh Kamath, popularly known as Fr Santosh, born on October 5, 1939 in Bajpe, is marking his 80th birthday today. Before we go further, let us wish him on his 80th birthday and pray for many more birthdays to come.

Those who have read Julius Caesar by Shakespeare will remember the famous funeral oration on the steps of the Roman senate where the blood-soaked dead body of Caesar, stabbed to death by Brutus, is kept for the public to view. Mark Antony dwells on three ideas in his oration. He says the good that a man does is buried with his bones while the evil that he does lives on. He also says that he was there to bury Caesar and not to praise him. Finally, he declares that it was not that he loves Caesar less but he loves Rome more. With this rhetoric speech he rouses the Roman audience which turns against Brutus.

Present day funeral orators say things contrary to Mark Antony’s protestation. They project the good that the dead did so that it lives on after him and let the evil that he did be buried with his bones. While the others take care of the burial part, present-day funeral orators are there primarily to praise the dead. He may not have loved the dead, or may not even know him while he was alive, but he is there to console the close relatives and friends who the departed leaves behind.

Funeral oration, also called panegyric, eulogy or desi Shraddanjali, is one of the central parts of ceremonies in the church for the dead among Christians. One of the ace practitioners of this art is Fr Ravi Santosh Kamath, S.J. He was a Pereira from Bajpe before he joined the Jesuit Order in 1958. From the very first year of his priesthood in 1971, he had started giving funeral orations – in Bombay, Mangaluru, Bengaluru and several other places in India and abroad, including 37 in New York where he was doing doctoral research. Incidentally, while the funeral oration is made, the dead body remains in an open coffin on a wheeled platform close to the altar and facing it.

Asked how he got into funeral orations, Fr Santosh explains that funerals need no invitation to attend. Yet, he is much sought after for this role. He also monitors obituary columns of local newspapers which give a short family profile. He particularly makes it a point to attend funerals where death is sudden – like cardiac arrest or in an accident or when it involves untimely death – young people. If he has to deliver the eulogy, he starts with some research on the grieving family, telephoning close neighbours and relatives.

The result is very telling. Listeners having no clue of Fr Santosh’s methodology and go back with the impression that he must have been closely linked to the mourning family for two generations. For, it is not easy to remember the names of the parents of the dead, the spouse, siblings, children and grandchildren (without any paper notes). His considerable stage presence, booming voice and a cocktail of languages hold his audience in rapt attention.

All this is conveyed in about 10 minutes flat. The mourners get surprised that this highly mobile priest (known for riding his motor-cycle) has been so concerned about them to offer solace in the choicest of warm and touching words. He tries to get into the feelings of the mourners and not deliver an impersonal point of view about the generalities of life and death and eternal punishment or reward thereafter. And he would be routinely referring to the dead or his close relatives with the prefix of auntie, uncle or sister (Murielbai in the case of my mother-in-law).

Another principle Fr Santosh follows is not to speak ill or negatively of the dead because, as he says, the dead cannot defend themselves. And there are always good things which cannot be taken away. He remembers an instance when a close relative of a dead lady arrived from a distant centre and was assigned to be the chief celebrant of the funeral mass. In this role, he has to give a few words of introduction at the start while the congregation remains standing. In this instance, he asked the audience to sit down and went on to deliver a 15-minute oration on his own. When Fr Santosh’s turn came to speak as invited funeral orator, he had nothing more to add except to endorse the earlier eulogy and say amen to that.

Fr Santosh, now marking his 80th year, has handled variety of functions including counselling youth and married couples, giving tuition to youngsters in foreign languages, preaching retreats to give new and positive direction to one’s life and raising toast at marriages. He peppers his preaching with vintage Latin and smoothly switches from language to language to suit his audience. That is because he has spoken and written felicity in twelve languages, including French, Italian, Spanish and German. The other point about him is easy accessibility. For instance, he was once, before mobiles came on the scene, available on seven land-line phone numbers of four institutions with which he is associated. Instead of funeral orations being a depressing chore, Fr Santosh says that this part of his priestly ministry has helped him to earn numerous friends who enrich his life.

Two facets of Fr Santosh’s life are less known. He visits the elderly to cheer them in their homes and also offers them Holy Communion which is a boon for the aged with motor disabilities. He is also a regular blood donor and I should know this because he donated blood for my mother, while at Fr Muller Hospital, even when he was a seminarian at Jeppu.

For Mangalurean Catholics, Fr Santosh with his multi-faceted ministry is an institution. May he continue his ministry for many more years to come!