Spoken eulogy opening following Church hymn (7)
I believe the answer is:
chorale
'hymn' is the definition.
(chorale is a kind of hymn)
'spoken eulogy opening following church' is the wordplay.
'spoken' becomes 'oral' ('oral' can be similar in meaning to 'spoken'**).
'opening' says to take the initial letters.
'following' says to put letters next to each other.
'church' becomes 'ch' (common abbreviation).
The initial letter of 'eulogy' is 'e'.
'oral'+'e'='orale'
'orale' after 'ch' is 'CHORALE'.
(Other definitions for chorale that I've seen before include "vocal music" , "hymn setting" , "Harmonised hymn tune" , "Simple hymn tune" , "Composition" .)