homegoing for a suicide victim

[Joseph Gill]

I read that the funeral for the Georgia pastor that killed himself was a real homegoing celebration. Quite understandably, the mourning congregation wanted to celebrate the life and ministry of Teddy Parker, Jr. His close friend, E. Dewey Smith, took effort in the eulogy to defend him from apparent critics in the blogosphere that declared he was now damned. They even read a letter of condolence from Rick Warren, the megachurch pastor whose own son committed suicide this year, that asserted that mental illness was not a sin. 

These sad events make me wonder how I would handle it if a church member took his or her own life. Would it be appropriate to celebrate as in any other homegoing? My instinct would be to avoid spouting doctrinal positions at a time that calls for comforting the family; but my own teaching would leave me unable to glibly assert the decedent was "looking down from heaven," or any of the other remarks we readily make at funerals. How would you preachers handle such a eulogy?