At MassLive.com today is the kind of photo you hope to never see: a group of dark-suited teenagers carrying the coffin of their friend into his funeral mass.
The friend was Conor Reynolds, the 17-year-old Springfield boy who was stabbed to death last weekend at a classmate’s birthday party. Police have since arrested another young Springfield man for the crime: 20-year-old Eric Denson, whom police describe as a “known gang member” with a criminal record that includes earlier arrests for assault and armed robbery, among other charges.
The scene today outside Holy Name parish—Springfield teens mourning the death of a contemporary—has been far to common in the city in recent years. The difference between the Reynolds case and some of the others—and it’s an uncomfortable, and perhaps not particularly PC, distinction to note—is that Reynolds was, by all accounts, an innocent, a young man who, according to reports, was trying to break up an argument and ended up dead. By contrast, much of the street violence in Springfield involves young people already caught up in the crime and gang activity that plagues the city. In all cases, of course, the fallout is terrible: young lives ended; residents left feeling that much more frightened and worried about their safety—and, in some cases, abandoning the city.
At Reynolds’ funeral mass this morning, the Rev. John E. Connors remembered him as a well-liked boy with an ever-present smile. “The news of Conor’s death was a message that shocked and saddened all who knew him. It has devastated a family. It has deeply wounded the Cathedral High School student body. It has torn at the fabric of the Forest Park community. It has caused jersey #5 to be missing from the soccer field. Hundreds have been impacted by this tragedy. Even former soccer opponents in Ludlow pause to give honor to this young man,” Connors said in his homily, which was shared with the media by the Springfield Catholic Diocese.
“And so it was last Saturday. We could scarcely believe it then … we can scarcely believe it now. We try to make sense out of something that does not seem to make any sense at all. Although we cannot fully understand … we can know this: we are all better—we are all blessed—for ever having known Conor.”
