Carita Kerr a ‘force of nature’ whose ‘passion was to help everybody be their best’

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Carita Kerr was a ‘force of nature’ whose ‘passion was to help everybody be their best’, mourners were told at her Funeral Mass in St. Eugene’s Cathedral.

The well-known teacher, actress and singer was laid to rest on Wednesday after her sad passing last Saturday.

Fr. Paul Farren, delivering the homily, spoke of her wonderful talent as a singer.

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"Carita described her singing as prayer, as the most wonderful and beautiful prayer. With faith as the anchor in her life Carita had a very strong moral compass and if truth be told there was very little grey in her life or her opinions and you never needed to wonder what Carita was thinking, she told you and she told you with great eloquence.

Carita Kerr with her late husband John in 2007.Carita Kerr with her late husband John in 2007.
Carita Kerr with her late husband John in 2007.

"In fact, she was so eloquent that it is the first time ever in preparing for a funeral that I thought I should have elocution lessons,” remarked Fr. Farren, to laughter from the congregation.

Mourners were reminded how Mrs. Kerr sang for Popes and hosted US Presidents.

“Carita was a force of nature. She was formidable. She was determined. She was driven and she never accepted defeat. She always knew that the impossible was actually possible and her courage and her energy proved that to be true and never more obviously than when with John she welcomed President Clinton to Derry the day after she had surgery for cancer.

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"Carita loved life and she lived it to the full. She loved, in a way, to be on the world stage and the world stage suited her. She died just one day before the 45th anniversary of her singing for Pope John Paul II in Drogheda. And while the world stage suited Carita her passion was to help everybody be the best that they could be,” Fr. Farren said.

Carita and John KerrCarita and John Kerr
Carita and John Kerr

Mrs. Kerr’s family were chief among mourners in the Cathedral. Fr. Farren told them how the ‘the heart of Carita's life was her family with John’.

“I know she was a wonderful and inspiring mother and grandmother,” said Fr. Farren.

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Much-loved Derry teacher, actress and singer Carita Kerr has died

The congregation were told of Mrs. Kerr’s public-spiritedness.

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"Carita was so committed to the arts, to music, to those with special needs, to children, to working mothers, to Derry, even though she had the joy of being born in Inishowen in Buncrana.

"Carita served her community and always believed that things could be better. She proved that she was right. Right to the end Carita stayed involved in the community and gave as much as she could.

"The last choir she was part of was the Melodies and Memories Choir and she loved it and they loved her.”

At the start of his Homily Fr. Farren spoke of a young Carita Boyle asking a priest about heaven when he visited her Buncrana home in the 1940s.

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At its close he observed: “It's a long time since she asked the priest about heaven. Today we pray that she has entered the fresh beauty of paradise where she is free and where her singing voice is as wonderful as it ever was and she is part of the heavenly choir, probably doing a solo, and we pray that there in the magnificence and the grandeur of heaven Carita has the answer to her childhood question as she sees God face-to-face.”

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