Alaska cemetery manager remembered as “salt of the earth”

CatholicAnchor.org
David Belanger, the longtime manager of Catholic cemeteries for the Anchorage Archdiocese, passed away on the morning of Good Friday, April 3, after battling cancer. He was 77.

Over the past 15 years he dug scores of graves and laid to rest the bodies and ashes of hundreds of Alaskans, while helping those left behind deal with their losses.

In 1999, the tall bearded man with a firm handshake and hearty laugh started managing the physical facilities of the archdiocese, including Catholic cemeteries. A major part of Belanger’s job was helping families select gravesites, navigate burial planning and design and install monuments in gravesites located in Anchorage and the Mat-Su Valley.

Belanger was an active member of Sacred Heart Church in Wasilla.

Much of his work involving the cemeteries was done with the assistance of his wife of 54 years, Priscilla. Together they believed that their most important task was spiritual — to offer hope in the face of overwhelming despair.

In 2007 Belanger told the Catholic Anchor that he and his wife believed they were put on the earth, in part, to help bury the dead and share their faith that someday all those bodies will rise again.

“In Wasilla, we personally dig the hole, close it back up, lower the casket and put the headstone on,” he said in 2007. During the summer, the couple also mowed the grass and watered the flowers.

Belanger never planned to become a cemeterian. The door opened in 1999, however, when then Anchorage Archbishop Francis Hurley asked him to help bury a man who had donated a tract of land in Wasilla to become a future archdiocesan cemetery. Belanger accepted the task and from there he and his wife began shaping forested land into Sacred Heart Cemetery.

A large empty cross rises from the center of Sacred Heart Cemetery as a physical reminder of the Christian belief in the resurrection of the body. Below the cross a Scripture passage reads, “He is risen, he is not here.”

In a society where Christian faith in increasingly marginalized, Belanger found that the hope of resurrection was often lost or discarded, which inspired him to affirm it all the more.

“The tie into resurrection brings the reality that this was a person we knew but they are now motionless and have gone on to their eternal reward,” he explained in 2007.

Belanger’s April 9 funeral Mass at Sacred Heart was celebrated by Anchorage Archbishop Roger Schwietz. Belanger’s good friend Father Steven Moore preached the homily, noting that Belanger’s life was one that exhibited the love and great hope of the Christian message.

“David’s life was an eloquent preaching of the Gospel,” he said. “He was salt of the earth.”

Belanger’s family, which includes three sons, their wives and 13 grandchildren, wrote of Belanger: “He was the best husband and father figure that ever walked. Dave was an instant ‘papa’ to all who walked through his door and angels envied his hugs. He has created, and leaves behind, a legacy of strength in faith, family and friendship.”