Mass Honors Fallen Haitian Couple

A Haitian couple who died in a hail of gunfire while taking English classes together were honored in a memorial mass punctuated by the sobs of relatives.
    
The funeral mass "seeks to do what seems impossible -- to try to make sense of what is utterly senseless, to find words where words are empty,'' the Rev. Clarence Rumble of the Church of the Holy Family said during his homily Saturday for Marc Henri Bernard, 44, and his 46-year-old wife, Marie Sonia Bernard.
    
The Bernards died along with 12 others, including shooter Jiverly A. Wong, in an April 3 mass shooting at the American Civic Association in nearby Binghamton.
    
The couple left behind a 12-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter. Both children were at the funeral Saturday, along with about 30 other family members, five of whom had traveled from Haiti for the service.
    
"While mourners can provide comfort, they can't know the depth of your anguish or understand why this tragedy happened,'' Rumble told family members, who sat in the front pews of the church.
    
But "what is impossible for us is possible for God,'' he added. "God's promise to never abandon you is as real as the pain you feel.''
    
Some of that anguish became visible at the end of the mass when the wails of Marie Sonia's mother, Marie Therese Esther, echoed through the church. The woman, who had come from Haiti for the service, was helped down the aisle of the church by family members.
    
The mourners, who numbered about 150, included Binghamton Mayor Matthew T. Ryan and Suzanne McLeod, superintendent of the Union-Endicott Central School District where the two Bernard children attend school.
    
An emotionally drained Ryan said he had been to every service for the victims of the shooting.
    
"It's important to show that the whole city is sharing their grieving and mourning,'' Ryan told The Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin. "You don't feel the depth of the tragedy until you greet those who lost loved ones.''
    
The funeral mass began with two caskets, one white and one gray, being wheeled down the center aisle of the church to the altar. The ceremony ended with 18-year-old Roberta Esther reading a personal reflection that she had written herself about Marie Sonia and Marc.
    
The teenager thanked the community for its help and support and remembered the Bernards as wonderful parents and the innocent victims of a senseless crime.
    
"To all family members, close and distant, to all other co-workers and finally to all those who had the honor to know them, I say courage. Let's brace ourselves, and not move on, but move forward from this tragedy and vow never to forget them in our prayers,'' she said.
    
The Bernard children held family members' hands as they left the church. The children will live with a family in Endwell.