A daughter of the Limerick murder victim, Mr John Ryan, read a letter to her dead father at his funeral Mass yesterday. "We'll protect each other the way you protected us, " promised 20-year-old Sammy-Joe Ryan.
"We love you, we can't stop thinking about you and you'll be in our hearts for ever," she said.
At the beginning of the Mass a hammer, a trowel and a measuring tape were brought to the altar as a reminder of the man who was described as "gifted with his hands".
A photograph of him with his daughter Bernadette, who died as a child, was placed on his white marble coffin.
Mr Ryan's five daughters and seven-year-old son, John jnr, comforted their distraught mother, Christina, during the service.
John Ryan was gunned down while working on a garden patio last Monday evening at a house in the Thomondgate area of Limerick.
Ms Mary Ryan, Eddie Ryan's widow and a sister-in-law of John Ryan, left the church in tears as How Can I Live Without You? was played on a CD player.
In November 2000 Ms Ryan stood in the same church for her husband's funeral, after he was shot dead in the Moose Bar in Limerick city three years ago.
During his homily yesterday the local curate, Father Michael O'Shea, prayed for an end to violence, which has now claimed three lives.
"We have to say the tragedy of John's death should not have happened. There is no excuse to take another person's life.
"No one has the right to inflict such pain on anyone or another family. Everyone here today has a role to play in ending violence in our city," said Father O'Shea.
The murders of Mr Ryan (47) and of Mr Eddie Ryan have been linked to a continuing feud between the Ryan and Keane families which has claimed three lives in as many years.
It is understood that John Ryan's murder was a direct reprisal for the execution of Mr Kieran Keane, who was shot dead last January.
John Ryan's nephews, Kieran and Eddie Ryan, who were allegedly abducted shortly before Kieran Keane's murder, helped carry their uncle's coffin from St Lelia's Church in Kileely yesterday.
He was buried in Mount St Oliver cemetery.