O Salutaris: Between here and there

Pa Henare Tate, the elderly Catholic priest who conducted the requiem mass for the artist Ralph Hotere, did so in Maori, Latin and English, with a bit of French thrown in here and there for good measure. At one point he referred to Ralph as a 'Latinist' as well as an artist. Because of the large crowd assembled on Mātihetihe marae at the end of a gravel road on the North Island's remote west coast north of the Hokianga Harbour, the mass was held in the whare hui or meeting house called Tu Moana (At the Ocean) rather than in the small church, called Hato Hemi (St James). The meeting house had room for about a hundred and fifty mourners, and at least that number spilled out across the marae next to the adjacent church and the whare kai or dining room called Nga Ringa Rau o Te Akau (The Hundred Hands of Te Akau).