How is the hymn Abide with me used in Catholic Liturgy and private prayer?

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I was thinking that if the word eventide was used at a funeral it can’t simply refer to evening but to something about death.
But the hymn doesn’t seem to be a prayer for the deceased but for the one singit it.
The text is either a prayer by a sick (or dying) person or a person praying in the evening. And remember, the person in the text hasn’t died yet.
How does this fit with a funeral?

I think this recording is pretty interesting: Spotify
 
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You’re correct that the hymn is a prayer that might be said by a sick or dying person. It’s believed that Lyte wrote the words when still a young curate after visiting a friend (Augustus le Hunte) who was dying and repeating the words ‘abide with me’ over and over again. Many years later, when Lyte himself was close to death he remembered the hymn and gave the manuscript to a relative who later published it.

I’m not Catholic but the Liturgy Office of the Catholic Bishop’s Conference of England and Wales provides a text for planning a Catholic funeral. They list several traditional hymns, most of which are Anglican and include ‘Abide with me.’ In turn, most of these hymns are not directly concerned with death or the deceased.

‘Abide with me’ is an Anglican hymn written at a time when Classical Anglicanism as defined by the Book of Common Prayer, 39 Articles and Homilies was the norm. As such, the doctrine of Purgatory was rejected and prayers for the dead weren’t used.
 
It’s because a funeral, a requiem mass is first for the deceased and secondly for those attending so the words of mortality and hope in God’s promises are for us too that’s what I feel about the words and it’s applicability to a funeral, it’s apparently one of the most requested hymns by those who lose a loved one here. In a way the deceased is still evangelising, those who don’t go to church regularly are here, and singing these moving words about abiding ie staying with god through our life until all seems to be darkening.
 
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It is a song with words we would be wise to pray every day, as we pray for a happy death in our night prayers.
 
The 1662 BCP burial follows Reformation doctrine that it’s wrong and futile to treat the rite as affecting the status before God of the deceased.

The bulk of the 1662 service is a long scripture reading designed to edify the living rather than to maintain a relationship with the deceased. The corpse alone was committed to the ground; prayers concerned the welfare of the mourners and no attempt was made to commend the soul of the deceased to God.

The 1662 service is one of simplicity and humility before our Redeemer and Judge. The mortal remains are committed to destruction and it is God’s grace that is the sole determinant of human salvation.
 
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