Becky's last song is one she wanted for her wedding day
Dr Barry Jones and his wife Aisling with their three sons, Jack, Jed and Ollie at the in Dublin yesterday
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BECKY JONES had a favourite Declan O'Rourke song, and hoped to hear it at her wedding.
Instead, the singer-songwriter turned up yesterday to perform the hit song at the funeral of the 20-year-old, who made medical history in May when she underwent a double lung transplant operation.
"I've heard Becky wanted this song to be the first song played at her wedding," O'Rourke told the large congregation.
"If we all close our eyes and listen now, who's to say that it didn't happen?" he said, and started a mournful version of his much-loved song, 'Galileo'.
Hundreds turned up yesterday to the Church of Our Lady, Castleknock, Dublin, to pay their final farewells to Becky, who died last Sunday, less than four months since her double lung transplant operation at the University Hospital of South Manchester on May 29.
She was the first cystic fibrosis sufferer to undergo the transplant while suffering from a common airborne fungus called multi-resistant aspergillus.
"I whispered in her ear and told her it was okay to go, because her spirit will always be with us," her father, Dr Barry Jones, told the church as he broke down in tears.
He said that his daughter never lost her optimism, love for life and upbeat spirit, even as her health deteriorated over the last number of weeks.
"She led a normal life for a little while," he said.
Dr Jones thanked the staff in the hospitals that had treated his daughter, and everybody that had supported the family.
The young woman was described as having brought warmth to all those around her.
"I asked her how her love life was going and she said, 'About as well as yours,'" Fr Richard Hendrick joked.
"She was alive, awake, aware, these are the qualities of a saint."
She is survived by her parents Barry and Aisling, her brothers Jack, Jed and Ollie, and a wide circle of family and friends.
Following the service, her body was taken to be cremated at the Glasnevin crematorium.
Anyone wishing to donate in her memory has been asked to donate to the Mater Hospital Heart/Lung Transplant Unit.
- Luke Byrne
Irish Independent
