Service of Thanksgiving for Sarah Montgomery and Baby Liam Arthur
The Service of Thanksgiving for Sarah Montgomery and her baby, Liam Arthur, was held at Donaghadee Parish Church on Thursday 10 July 2025, at 3.00pm, following an earlier private family Service of Committal.
The Revd Ian Gamble, Rector of Donaghadee, made the following comments at the introduction of the service:
‘The tragic death of Sarah and baby Liam has left a deep wound on a close and quiet family in our town. It has left a deep wound on the community up in Elmfield and across Donaghadee. Sarah Montgomery was a quiet and much loved Donaghadee girl. A young mother, sister, a loving daughter to her late parents, and a cherished granddaughter.
‘Sarah had many friends from her days at school in our town and she was very much a part of our local community. Our community has rallied around her family in a wonderful way, the vigil at Elmfield was an immediate heartfelt response that also highlighted the continued violence against women.
‘I know that support for Sarah’s family is ongoing and they would want me to express sincere thanks for all that our town of Donaghadee is doing to both recognise how much Sarah was valued and will be missed but also the practical support given to them over these difficult days.
‘CS Lewis, an Ulsterman and author of the children’s Narnia books, also wrestled with the hard questions of life, like grief and pain. He said this when wondering how we cope with pain:
“When pain is to be borne, a little courage helps more than knowledge, a little human sympathy more than courage, and the least tincture of the love of God more than all.”
‘It is God’s love that Sarah’s family and our community need to experience – a love that is all embracing – even in the struggle to find answers to the difficult “why questions” that resound in our hearts when we feel the pain of the loss of Sarah and baby Liam and the wound that this leaves on her family and on this town.’
The following tribute was given by the Revd Kathy Couchman, who officiated at the service:
‘On behalf of Arthur and Edie and the family, I must thank everybody so much for all the love, care and kindness that you have shown them in the heartbreaking days since the deaths of Sarah and of her baby, Liam Arthur. They have been totally overwhelmed with such incredible support from friends, from the community here in their hometown of Donaghadee and from many folk, previously unknown to them, from farther afield.
‘At the darkest time in their lives, when they are carrying the weight and pain of loss that is unimaginable and just too hard to bear alone, Arthur, Edie and their family would like everyone to know that they value every gesture of your love and kindness, every thought, prayer, card, message and act of support, more than you will ever realise.
‘Sarah grew up in Donaghadee; this is where she spent her life and where she was so involved in the life of the town and her community. She has always been very proud of Donaghadee and so immensely proud especially to be Arthur and Edie Arbuckle’s granddaughter and to have a Granda who was, ‘Arthur Arbuckle, the lifeboatman’. Sarah’s love for the lifeboats has been life-long and she had great interest and pride in following her Mummy in fundraising for the RNLI.
‘In their online tribute to her, Donaghadee RNLI said: “Sarah was a highly regarded member of our fundraising branch…regularly attending and helping out at fundraising and station events to support the lifesaving work of the charity.” Sarah was so proud of the RNLI and as her own little girls arrived, they, too have grown to love their trips to the lifeboat house.
‘As a young girl, Sarah followed in her Mummy’s footsteps when she joined GB (Girls’ Brigade), and Sarah’s girls are carrying on that family tradition with GB at Shore Street Presbyterian Church. Sarah also honoured her Mummy’s memory by fundraising, not only for the RNLI, but also with the Ladies’ Guild. Family has always been so important to Sarah.
‘Many of you have spoken of remembering her as a child. Sarah’s Granda and Granny speak with great pride of the lovely little girl, who did so well at Donaghadee Primary School and loved to ride her bike. From Sarah’s first days, there was always a strong bond between Sarah and her grandparents, a bond which grew even stronger when Sarah and her brothers later lost their parents and Granda and Granny were so lovingly there for them. Granda felt so proud as he wheeled baby Sarah round in her pram.
‘He soon moved on to teach her how to ride a bike and, much later, to drive a car. They would spend many an hour on a car park, where Arthur would instruct Sarah to reverse the whole length of the car park, using her mirrors; “…but I need to be able to drive a car forwards, Granda,”, Sarah would say. Granda would reply, “Anyone can drive forwards, Sarah, but not many can reverse properly.”
‘Sarah was just a born carer. Her friends and family have all spoken of how she had a “heart of gold”, of how caring she was, not only towards people she knew, but to anyone who needed help, and Arthur and Edie have told me just how much love and kindness she has shown them throughout her life and how much she has done to help them.
‘When Sarah’s brothers were born, she would help her Mummy, Linda, and Daddy, Andrew, look after them. Sadly, both Linda and Andrew died at far too early an age, within a few short years of each other. Sarah, then just a very young woman, took over the care for her brothers and she continued to care for them, alongside her Granda and Granny, until the day she died, all through the time since her own two little girls arrived; and, oh, how she loved being Mummy to those little girls.
‘The girls were the centre of Sarah’s world and were always looked after so beautifully. “Just the best Mummy”, one of Sarah’s much-loved friends has said about her and that description of her has been echoed so many times by the many people in the town, and at the local school, who knew her.
‘Sarah was so looking forward to being a Mummy also to her baby, Liam Arthur. It is an utter tragedy that none of us has had, or ever will have, the chance to know him, to see him as a little boy or grown into a young man, but his was a life, a very precious life, that we must recognise and give thanks for. His was a life that was so dearly loved and cherished by Sarah, who would have been the best, most loving Mummy to him, too. She had everything ready to welcome him to this world, to her family and to her girls. Thoughtful as ever, Sarah had had clothes prepared for Liam Arthur, embroidered with his name.
‘We have seen so many tributes to Sarah over the past 11 days. They tell of a beautiful, caring, gentle and thoughtful young woman, who lived for her family and treasured her friendships. Sarah – Mummy, granddaughter, sister, friend – in death as in life, she has touched so many hearts, far and wide, as has her baby, Liam Arthur.
‘Our community is in shock and in mourning for them, and the response that we have seen, the love and support that has been shown to the family has been just incredible. Today we are giving thanks for them both and it’s the saddest of privileges to be able do that here in our church. But let’s be clear about this, it should not be like this; we should not be here today, having to say “goodbye” to Sarah, a beautiful, caring young Mummy with everything to live for, and to her baby, Liam Arthur, who has not even been allowed his moment of birth, let alone a breath of life beyond his Mummy.
‘A grandmother and grandfather shouldn’t be burying their granddaughter and her baby; that is not how it should be. Sarah should be with her family, with her little girls, getting ready for the arrival of her baby boy. Sarah and Liam Arthur and his sisters should have a future ahead of them, but that future has been brutally and unjustly snatched away from them, and from their family and friends. This isn’t right; this isn’t how it should be, and we must not lose sight of the fact that it is neither right, nor is it in any way excusable.
‘There are no words that can ever take away the pain and devastation that will now wrack the hearts and lives of Sarah’s family. Yet we will all use many words as we try to grapple with the vast flood of emotions that fill us when we think of this beautiful, caring young Mummy and her baby: there will be shock; there will be disbelief; there will be pain and deep, deep sadness. There will also be anger; there will be outrage at the brutality and injustice of taking away two such precious lives.
‘I do know that none of this was the will, or work, of God. We have a God who is a loving Father to us all, a Father who has also seen the earthly life of his own Son, Jesus Christ, snatched away so cruelly. I know that God loves every one of us, every single one of us, as his beloved child and whatever we go through in this life, he is with us through all of it; he is beside us in the love and person of his Son, Jesus Christ. Through all the darkest moments of our being, he is with us, carrying us when we no longer have the heart to carry ourselves, knowing us through and through and feeling our grief and pain. When we suffer, God suffers; when we weep, our loving God weeps.
‘The words of Psalm 139 are included today because they tell of how well we are known by God and how much he cares for us. They tell of how precious we are to him from the very start of our lives:
“For it was you who formed our inward parts;
you knit us together in our mothers’ wombs.
We praise you, for we are fearfully and wonderfully made.
Wonderful are your works; that we know very well.”
‘We need to hear and know that – for ourselves and most especially now, for Sarah and her baby; these were, and are, two lives that are both so important and precious to God.
‘We do, very much today, stand in the shadow of death, but we must not allow the cruelty that has stolen away those precious lives to steal away all our hope as well. And there is hope, though at this time, in the agony of your grief, it may seem that you will never feel hope again.
‘There is hope in this life, there is, there must be, great hope for the future of Sarah’s two little girls, for ourselves, and there is hope, too, that is born of love – the love that has brought you here today, that has led so many to reach out to the family in great kindness, the love that shows just how much goodness actually surrounds us in this life in the hearts of so many.
‘All love comes first from God and in that love, he sent his Son, Jesus Christ, to save us from eternal death by overcoming death himself, and to bring us hope. That hope tells us that death does not have the last word, that this world is not the end of Jesus’ story, nor need it be the end of ours, because we are offered, through Christ, another life, our true home with him in heaven. Just listen again to those words that we heard from the Book of Revelation:
“See, the home of God is among mortals.
He will dwell with them;
they will be his peoples, and God himself will be with them;
he will wipe every tear from their eyes.
Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more,
for the first things have passed away.”
‘That is the hope that we must hold on to, it is the promise of Christ that we will not be abandoned in the shadows of death, and we are claiming that promise today for Sarah and for her baby, Liam Arthur. May they rest now in peace and safety in the loving arms of God. Amen.’