Catholic eulogy examples
If a priest has told you that you cannot give a eulogy, he is not being difficult. There is a rule, it is unfamiliar to most families, and there is almost always a way to say what you want to say.
Last updated 31 August 2026
Why you were told no
The Order of Christian Funerals — the rite the Church follows — addresses this directly. Section 141 states that a brief homily based on the readings should always be given at the funeral liturgy, but never any kind of eulogy. It goes further and warns that the homily itself should avoid a eulogistic style.
The reasoning is that a Funeral Mass is not primarily a tribute. It is a prayer for the person who has died, and the focus is meant to rest on their hope of resurrection rather than on a summary of their achievements. That is why the priest speaks about the readings rather than about the deceased’s career.
It is not a judgement on your family, and it is not the priest’s personal preference.
What you can usually do instead
Words of remembrance at the Mass
Section 170 of the same rite allows that a member or friend of the family may speak in remembrance of the deceased before the final commendation — near the end of the Mass, after communion.
Note the word may. It is permitted rather than required, and how it is applied varies a great deal. In practice most parishes that allow it will ask for:
- One speaker only
- Two to three minutes, sometimes less
- The text submitted in advance, occasionally read by the priest
- A reflection that connects the person to their faith rather than a biography
A full eulogy at the Vigil
The Vigil — the wake, or rosary, usually the evening before — is where a proper eulogy belongs in Catholic practice. It is far less restricted. Several people can speak, it can be longer, and the tone can be as warm and personal as you like.
Some dioceses direct all eulogies there as a matter of policy. The Archdiocese of Philadelphia, for instance, states plainly that the most appropriate time to give a eulogy at a Catholic funeral is during the Vigil.
Ask these three questions
Rules differ between dioceses and between parishes in the same diocese. One phone call to the parish office settles it:
- May a family member speak at the Mass, and for how long?
- Do you need to see the text beforehand?
- Would you prefer we do the longer tribute at the Vigil?
Ask early. Finding out on the day is how families end up upset with a priest who was simply following the rite.
How to write words of remembrance
It is a different piece of writing from a eulogy, and the difference is not only length.
- One quality, not a life. Choose a single thing about them and one memory that shows it. There is no room for more.
- Connect it to their faith where it is true. Not forced piety — the actual thing. She said a rosary every night. He drove three people to Mass for eleven years. He kept a saint’s medal in the van.
- Speak to the room, not about a CV. Job titles, qualifications and lists of survivors belong in the order of service.
- End with a prayer or a commendation, not with a joke. “Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord” is a natural close and every Catholic in the room can answer it.
- Stay inside your time. If you were given three minutes, write 350 words and no more.
Two complete examples
Words of remembrance for Bernadette Kelleher, given at the Mass by her son
About 300 words · two and a half minutes
Father, thank you for allowing me a few moments.
My mother kept a rosary in her coat pocket, and it was not a good one. It was plastic, it was blue, and one of the decades had been repaired with fishing line by my father in about 1988.
She had better ones. She had one from Knock in a box on the dressing table that she never once used.
She used the blue one, every day, walking. That was her way of it. She was not a woman for sitting still and she was not a woman for long words about faith. She prayed on the move, between the house and the shop, and if you walked with her she would carry on and simply not include you in the conversation.
She prayed for people by name. All of us, constantly, and quite a number of people who had no idea. She told my sister once that she had been praying for a neighbour for nine years over something the neighbour had never mentioned to her.
That is what I want to say about my mother in this church. She believed it, ordinarily and without fuss, for eighty-one years, and she carried it in her pocket alongside her keys and a great deal of loose change.
The rosary is with her today. My sister put it in her hand on Tuesday.
Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon her.
A eulogy for Antoni Zieliński, given at the Vigil by his granddaughter
About 420 words · about three minutes
My grandfather came to this parish in 1974 and he sat in the same pew for fifty-two years, third from the back on the left, and he became genuinely irritated if anyone else was in it.
He was not a warm man in the way people mean when they say warm. He was formal. He wore a tie to everything, including, memorably, a barbecue. He shook hands with his own grandchildren until we were about twelve.
But he was there. That was the whole of him. He was there on Sunday, and he was there at every funeral this parish had for five decades, including for people he barely knew, because he said that a person should not be buried in front of an empty church.
He counted. He would come home and tell my grandmother how many had come, and he was quietly furious on behalf of anyone poorly attended.
He did the same with the practical things. He fixed the boiler in the parish hall four times. He drove Mrs Nowicka to Mass every Sunday for nine years and described this, when asked, as “convenient,” which it was not, as she lived in the opposite direction.
He left Poland at nineteen and I do not know very much about that, because he would not discuss it, and I have accepted that I am not going to find out now.
What I do know is that a man who had good reason to think the world was unreliable spent fifty-two years being extremely reliable, in one building, in one pew, third from the back on the left.
Look at this room tonight. He would be counting. He would be very pleased and he would say something dismissive about the flowers.
Dziadku — the church is full. You would have hated the fuss and you would have counted every one of us.
A note on getting this right
This page describes the general rite and common practice. Your parish may be more permissive or more strict, and the priest’s instruction is the one that applies on the day. Ask, early, and write to whatever he tells you.
If you are also speaking somewhere less restricted, the general guidance on how to write a eulogy and eulogy structure applies to the Vigil.
Also on this site
Funeral speech examples separates the five different speeches given at a funeral, which are not all eulogies. Celebration of life speech examples has three complete celebration of life speeches, including a closing toast. Our set of memorial service speech examples has three memorial speeches, including a workplace memorial and a scattering. Our step-by-step guide to writing a eulogy walks through the whole thing in six steps, from a blank page to something you can say out loud.