The funeral prayer was presided over by the Greek Orthodox Metropolitan of Mount Lebanon, Archbishop Silwan Moussa, representing the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch and All the East, John X. He was assisted by the head of the Mar Elias Patriarchal Monastery – Shwaya, Bishop Constantine Kayal, and a group of priests.
After the Gospel was read, Moussa delivered a speech of lament in which he conveyed “the condolences of Patriarch John X, Metropolitan Georges Khader and Bishop Kayal,” thanking “Bo Saab conveyed the condolences of the three presidents.” He also thanked the Minister of Culture, and said: “I thank you all in the name of this beautiful family and in the name of our brother and our beloved, the artist of Lebanon and the Arab world, Sami.”
He added: “The gospel that we heard today has always lived with it. I will try to draw this parallel line between God’s word and our word, between God’s voice for us, Jesus, with the Word, our own voice, and what we say to each other. Sami, somewhere, means for all present, even if Our generations were not close to each other in depth, but he often addressed us in depth.The older generation and the younger generation during the period of the war in Lebanon, at a time when we were living what we were living through, he shook us with his word and voice what was the best that existed in that bad time, just as Jesus addresses us Today in the Gospel: Hear my voice, and those who do good will be raised to life, and those who have done evil will be judged.”
He continued: “Whoever had the desire for a little hope, had visions or a positive initiative, his voice and his word meant a lot. With many, he helped us at that time to rise at a time when we were at risk of staying in the grave, but we did not stay. There are those who helped us to do ourselves.” First, with each other second, and with our country third.This person and the grace that God gave him, helped many.This is one of the many aspects of this person, as he was committed to man, without interest, out of love and faithfulness to his faith, as he believed in goodness and human dignity, and sought To achieve this through his service in various associations and the care he made and through his talent in serving the poor and those in need of a school and medicine, and employed everything he owned in this field. He was a person who represented human commitment.”
And he added: “What distinguished him also was his love for this country and its people. Therefore, he devoted all his talent to spark in us not just a small joy, but to establish in us a covenant with this land, this church, this family, and this house, that between us and this land a covenant and commitment with its affairs and its afflictions. That we may win every man to love, to goodness, to goodness, and rather to life to one another, and no one negates the other.”
He said: “He has instilled in the youth of this country and in the Arab world that he has heard it, the originality that few can master. I feel that because he is the son of this Church, all of this emanates from the light of faith that he lived, so he embodied him in his life as a husband, as a father, as an artist, as a lover, as a friend. as a fellow, as a son of this church.”
He added: “We should thank Sami, and remember him in this thanksgiving, because the interest shown by the press here and abroad regarding his person, we will employ him in our prayers that we raise to God, where gratitude should cross the borders between each other to beat the sky, and open the mercies of God to him and to everyone who He served and planted in him a good foundation, so that his way grows in us, for gratitude should go beyond the tongue to gratitude that leads us to tire ourselves out for others and for each other.”
He concluded: “This is the spirit of the words of the Gospel, in which Christ says to each one of us: If you hear my words and live by them, you will live, and it is from these words that he heard that he gave us to live day after day. who love him.”
my condolences
After that, the body was buried in the family cemetery and the family accepted condolences in the church hall.
The family also continues to accept condolences tomorrow, Wednesday, in the hall of the St. Elias neighborhood church for the Greek Orthodox in Mtayleb from three in the afternoon until six in the evening.