Next Tuesday, a funeral will be held for the Rev. Paul Archambault, a Northampton native who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound last weekend at his home at the Our Lady of the Sacred Heart rectory in Springfield.

After plans for that service were announced, the Gazette heard from people who wondered about the church’s policy in cases of suicide. At one time, the Roman Catholic church took a firm stance against granting such rites to people who take their own lives. But that is no longer the case, according to Msgr. Christopher Connelly, the vicar general of the Springfield diocese.

“This is certainly a most sensitive issue, and no doubt one in which our Catholic understanding has evolved over time along with a better understanding of mental illnesses,” he said in an email message, in response to questions from the Gazette related to Rev. Archambault’s death. 

“To be certain the sanctity of human life is held in the highest regard because as people of faith we believe every individual is created in God’s image,” Msgr. Connelly said. “The factor here which must be considered is the mental capability of the person.”

Bishop Timothy A. McDonnell acknowledged the priest’s personal struggles in a message he issued this week. The bishop called Archambault, 42, a devout person who was “a good and pastoral priest” and “a caring chaplain.”

“Yet, he was not immune to illness. Most of us realize that physical illness can be fatal; we sometimes forget that the same is true of illnesses that have no physical cause but wrack the spirit still,” the bishop said.

The bishop continued that public message this way: “We pray our merciful God bring Father Paul safely home, rewarding all the good he accomplished and relieving the burdens he found unbearable. May he rest in peace.”

A passage in the Catechism of the Catholic Church states that mental anguish can so affect a person as to relieve him or her of blame for suicide. Paragraph 2,282 in that document reads, “Grave psychological disturbances, anguish, or grave fear of hardship, suffering, or torture can diminish the responsibility of the one committing suicide.”

Msgr. Connelly said that Tuesday’s services for Rev. Archambault communicate to all that, as he put it, “We are never to despair of God’s mercy.

“In offering Christian burial rites, the church offers hope and healing to a grieving family and community and entrusts the soul of the faithful departed to God,” the monsignor said.

Rev. Archambault’s funeral will be held at 11 a.m. at the Church of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Parish on King Street in Northampton. A wake will precede it Monday from 4 to 7 p.m.

The funeral liturgy will be celebrated by Bishop McDonnell himself.