'Adam was my best friend . . . my hero'
NORFOLK -- Honor, courage, determination, humor, friendship, and faith.
Those are the attributes that Army Sergeant Adam P. Kennedy represented to his brother Colin and six of the soldier's friends, who eulogized the Iraq casualty yesterday before several hundred mourners at St. Jude's Church.
"Adam was my best friend and also my hero," Colin Kennedy said from the pulpit. "He went out and lived his childhood dream."
When Colin Kennedy was finished and when all the tributes and consolations were over, Kennedy's relatives, friends, comrades, and neighbors stood at their pews and filled the overflowing church with the sound of a long, standing ovation.
Kennedy, 25, was killed April 8 when a roadside bomb ripped apart his Humvee about 25 miles southeast of Baghdad. A graduate of Xaverian Brothers High School in Westwood and Norwich University in Vermont, Kennedy had been in Iraq since October with the Fourth Brigade Combat Team of the 25th Infantry Division.
Kennedy is the 51st member of the armed forces from Massachusetts to be killed in Iraq. Thirteen from the state have died in Afghanistan.
A football linebacker at Xaverian Brothers and a star weight lifter, Kennedy graduated first in his class from Army basic training after he was rejected by the Marines because of concussions he suffered while playing football.
Kennedy oversaw the security detail for the colonel commanding his brigade. Although the unit faced daily danger, including mortar attacks and roadside explosions, Kennedy kept his thoughts on Iraq even when he visited home on leave in December, his brother said.
"He felt the need and responsibility to get back to his troops," Colin Kennedy said.
Monsignor Peter Conley, who was principal celebrant for the funeral Mass, reminded the gathering of that sacrifice.
"Adam's death comes from our human freedom, which can be a blessing or a curse," Conley said. "Let it not be whispered that Adam Kennedy died in vain.
"This is a man who kept his promise, and it was a promise made to us," Conley said of Kennedy. "He did it unto death."
The mourners included Governor Deval Patrick, members of the military, and officers from local and State Police. A broadcast feed from the service was relayed to the church basement, which was used to accommodate part of the crowd on a cold, wet morning.
Jim Kennedy, the victim's uncle, urged the congregation to remember the soldier's special qualities and incorporate them into everyday life. "If you're not moved and you're not inspired by that kind of thing, then I'm not sure you're really breathing," he said.
David Errico, a family friend from Cocoa, Fla., who had introduced Kennedy's parents to one another, recalled the "beautiful little boy" he had watched grow into "the man he turned out to be."
"We knew that Adam was doing what he loved, but that doesn't make it right and it doesn't make it fair," Errico said in a tribute that focused on snatches of happy memories accumulated over 25 years.
After the Mass, to the sounds of "America the Beautiful," a military honor guard rolled the casket to the doors of the church, where the coffin was draped with an American flag.
Then, as a color guard faced the church in the rain, the casket was carried to a waiting hearse while bagpipers played "The Minstrel Boy," an old Irish lament for a young soldier who dies in battle.
Kennedy was buried at Knollwood Memorial Park in Canton. The funeral procession was escorted by police and the Patriot Guard Riders, veterans on motorcycles who attend the funerals of all US service members killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. 