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CNN Live Event/Special
Carroll O'Connor's Funeral Held in Los Angeles
Aired June 26, 2001 - 14:12 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LOU WATERS, CNN ANCHOR: We are taking you to Los Angeles, the funeral for actor Carroll O'Connor. At the lectern, actor Larry Hagman.
(JOINED IN PROGRESS)
LARRY HAGMAN, ACTOR: ... an affliction, and there going forth from us utter destruction. But there in peace, where if before men at dead, they be punished, yet is there hope for immortality. Chastised a little, they shall be greatly blessed because God tried them and found them worthy of himself.
As God -- as gold in furnace he proved them, and as sacrificial offerings he took them to himself. Those who trust him shall understand truth, and the faithful shall abide with him in love because grace and mercy are with his holy ones and his care is with his elect.
This is the word of the Lord.
WATERS: Larry Hagman, we have Paul Vercammen at the scene of this what has been called a celebration of life. Tell us what we just heard and what we're about to hear -- Paul.
PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, you have to remember Larry Hagman and Carroll O'Connor go way back, decades back. They were both broke, struggling actors in New York, and they formed quite a friendship. So, Larry Hagman came here today. Another good friend will also step up in just a short while. That will be Martin Sheen, and he will read from First Corinthian, Chapter 13, verses 1 through 13.
Right now, you are hearing Psalm 122 and the cantor is Marie Hodson (ph), and we'll listen to this for a while.
(PSALM 122)
VERCAMMEN: From what we understand now, Martin Sheen will be up second to give the second reading here. You may have recognized Cardinal Roger Mahoney from the L.A. archdiocese. Also, the homilist will be Reverend Harold J. Powers -- Martin Sheen.
MARTIN SHEEN, ACTOR: I may be able to speak the language of human beings and even of angels, but if I have no love, my speech is no more than a noisy gong or a clanging bell. I may have the gift of inspired preaching, I may have all the knowledge and understand all secrets, I may have all the faith needed to move mountains, but if I have no love, I am nothing. I may give away everything I have and even give up my body to be burned, but if I have no love, this does me no good.
Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or conceited or proud; love is not ill-mannered or selfish or irritable; love does not keep a record of wrongs; love is not happy with evil, but is happy with the truth; love never gives up, and its faith, hope and patience never fail; love is eternity. There are inspired messages, but they are temporary; there are gifts of speaking in strange tongues, but they will cease; there is knowledge, but it will pass, for our gifts of knowledge and of inspired messages are only partial; but when what is perfect comes, then what is partial will disappear.
When I was a child, my speech, feeling and thinking were all those of a child; now that I am an adult, I have no more use for childish ways. What we see now is like a dim image in a mirror, then we shall see face to face. What I know now is only partial; then it will be complete, as complete as God's knowledge of me, and now these three remain: Faith, hope and love, but the greatest of these is love.
VERCAMMEN: That, of course, Carroll O'Connor's good friend, actor Martin Sheen, star of "The West Wing." While this mass is public, Carroll O'Connor's burial will be private. Reporting from Westwood, I'm Paul Vercammen.
Now back to you, Lou.
WATERS: All right, Paul, Carroll O'Connor probably was best know for playing Archie Bunker in the landmark 1970s series, "All in the Family." O'Connor appeared in over 30 movies during his long career, and acted in numerous plays. In recent years, he starred in the television drama "In the Heat of the Night." Still, it's always the opinionated and rarely enlightened Archie Bunker that he may be best remembered and treasured.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "ALL IN THE FAMILY")
CARROLL O'CONNOR, ACTOR: This is America, land that I love.
ROB REINER, ACTOR: Well, I love it too, Mr. Bunker. It's because I do I protest when I think things are wrong.
O'CONNOR: Then stand beside her, and guide her through the night with the light from above.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "ALL IN THE FAMILY")
O'CONNOR: You don't know nothing about Lady Liberty, standing there in the harbor, with her torch on high, screaming out to all the nations in the world: Send me your poor, your deadbeats, your filthy, and all the nations sent them in here. They come swarming in like ants, Hispanics...
(LAUGHTER)
O'CONNOR: ... your Japs, your Chinamen, your Krauts and your Hebs and the...
(LAUGHTER)
O'CONNOR: ... and they all come in here and they were all free to live in their own separate sections.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP, "ALL IN THE FAMILY")
O'CONNOR: Pull that skirt down. Every time you sit down in one of them things the mystery's over.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
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