JOSEPHINE
ANA
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Heaven has claimed its last three little angels.
Emilie Parker, Josephine Gay and Ana Marquez-Greene — the last of the 27 victims of the Newtown massacre to be laid to rest — received tear-drenched farewells yesterday as their families and the nation continued to mourn them.
Parents and loved ones of Josephine, Ana and Emilie had little to say about Adam Lanza, the 20-year-old monster who took the girls away from them before ending his own life.
They simply remembered the good times and the all-too-short lives of their three little darlings.
Emilie Parker
Friends and family said farewell to the flaxen-haired 6-year-old girl in an Ogden, Utah, church across the street from where her parents, Robbie and Alissa Parker, met several years ago.
Even strangers there honored the kindergartner by wearing pink — her favorite color — and wrapping pink ribbons and banners around poles and trees, The Salt Lake Tribune reported.
“I want you to know as we saw all of the ribbons and all of the effort you put into that, it made me and Alissa really feel like we were getting a big hug from everybody,” Robbie Parker said.
Emilie and her family had moved to Newtown about a year ago from Ogden.
Josephine Gay
The bells at Newtown’s St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church tolled once more yesterday, as family and friends remembered the 7-year-old girl who endured physical therapy nearly every day and who had just celebrated her seventh birthday.
“Joey” — as her family called her — was autistic and couldn’t speak.
But she communicated with her hands.
“You don’t need words to say I love you,” said her father, Bob during his eulogy.
Her sisters, Marie and Sophia, held that lesson close to their hearts as they said goodbye, piling presents by her coffin — Barbie dolls, a Barbie car and a stuffed chipmunk.
Pictures drawn by Josephine and Marie stood at the front of the church.
On one of Joey’s pictures were the words: “My hope and dream for this year is to read more books.”
Next to it, as if in stark response, was a picture drawn by Marie of Joey and the Sandy Hook teachers — as angels.
As Josephine’s small purple and white casket was led from the church, her mother, Michele, sang “On Eagles’ Wings,” leaning hard on her husband for support.
Ana Marquez-Greene
The 6-year-old girl loved to sing, and the people who loved her made sure not to say goodbye without a song.
Ana’s little white casket arrived at Bloomfield’s First Cathedral Church in a horse-drawn hearse, and her service began with mourners silently lighting candles for her classmates and teachers.
But then the somber ceremony gave way to song — as hundreds of mourners shook the rafters to honor the 6-year-old with curly black hair and deep brown eyes.
“Ana had a song,” the Rev. Paul Echtenkamp told The Connecticut Post. “It just came out of her.”
Her father, saxophonist Jimmy Greene, played at the service with Harry Connick Jr., with whom Greene has performed.
Ana and her family had moved to Newtown just five months ago from Winnipeg, Manitoba, and her funeral was also broadcast at the church she and her family attended there.