We all would love to be anywhere else in the world then here today. Yet, there is no other place we would rather be then right here, right now.

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all consolation, who comforts us in all our afflictions, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the consolation with which we ourselves are comforted by God.” (St. Paul)

Said at the casket:

Wood, lumber. Created and nurtured by God for its use during our human journey through life. To create or, in human terms, to recreate and to protect and nurture your life with new life. A recreated home from God’s blessed created woody gifts. Designed to warmly protect and safely raise a loving family, always done within Your holy name.

The tree talks to us this holy day, “I am the heat of your hearth on cold winter nights, the friendly shade screening you from the summer’s sun, and my fruits are refreshing, quenching your thirst as you journey onward. I am the beam that holds your house secured, the flat board of your table offering shared food from my earth, I am the bed on which you lie and peacefully rest.”

I am the handle of your hoe to till the rough soil, I am the always welcoming door of your homestead to both friend and stranger, the wood of your cradle that houses those three newborns and one day, that one unknown day, but far too soon … I will become the shell of your coffin.

Sermon

Duane thought he had a religious vocation. He knew he had a vocation.

Who was Duane? Outspoken, opinionated, politically very liberal, sarcastic and caustic.

Who am I? Shy, introverted, speaking either in small sentences or short phrases, very observant and absorbing of people and things around me but always with a tint to others of not being known in a mysterious sort of way.

Oh, wait? Did I switch the two of us around?

Duane spoke numerous sentences without speaking. I speak multiple sentences without anyone listening.

Duane thought he had a priestly vocation.

The year is 1965. Weekend retreats were common for young boys to find a seminary high school they’d wish to attend. I had to trek a whole twelve miles and his was in his backyard. Salvatorian Seminary. He knew the woods. He knew farming. He knew a hard days work. He knew discipline. He was taught early on the virtue of endurance to get a job done and get it done correctly and completely. He thought he wanted to be a priest. We met that weekend and we had absolutely nothing in common, except our search for that vocation in our lives. He was a dairy family’s son and I wanted to work at WOMT radio. But at Salvatorian Seminary that weekend, we both loved their bowling alley when guys needed to manually load the pins for the next frame.

As a high school junior, I got the radio job at WOMT radio. No one else was allowed in the studio but that didn’t stop us. Duane and friends would visit me on Saturday nights when I could play the rock songs. Sundays was reserved for polkas.

Duane thought he had a priestly vocation.

During our four high school years together we stayed connected and became friends. I admired him for his softness but also the strength of his character and he found me, well, amusing. Isn’t that the making of a lifelong friendship? Well, it worked. During those years, his very successful in cross country, track, and wrestling and I’m smoking cigarettes with fellow losers in the seminary woods.

But again, that nagging question that only any one can ask of himself/herself, and no one else. What should I do with my life? He told me that he didn’t want to be a dairy farmer like his parents but, at the same time, didn’t wish to disappoint them. Those thoughts run through your mind when you’re fourteen years old. He tells me that he should go to college and have the college decide for him. Since he’s not deciding himself. Since he’s shy, introverted and talks in small sentences and often short phrases. Duane decides, “After high school, I’ll go to UWGB and they’ll help my future be decided for me.” Didn’t happen. Institutions nor anyone else can determine or define your life’s future. I hope you find or have found that true in your own life. You, Duane, then uncovered your own path, found that personal drum living and drumming away within you and then proudly banged it hard and firmly throughout your entire adult life. (I think he lasted a semester or two at UWGB.)

Very early one morning, I ate breakfast with his family during those early years. He showed me how the cows were milked and then told me to take a shortcut back to the house. I walked knee deep into the cows’ SH__. He gives me a pair of shorts and his dairy family had a great laugh over city-slicker-me but still welcomed me to breakfast at 8:00 a.m. When I saw the huge spread of food, I thought to myself, “Why, this family is guilty of gluttony!” Duane smiled at me, knowing my thoughts, and said, “You get up at 4:00 a.m. and see how hungry you get!” So I enjoyed a wonderful breakfast, lunch and dinner – all in one, with my SH__ pants in their washer. Who says he didn’t have a sense of humor?

Duane falls in love and marries his high school roommate’s sister, Mary. (I think that’s illegal in most states!) But free haircuts! Three wonderful, but still introverted children He then enjoys what Frank Sinatra called, “the second time around” for eighteen years with Diane. And, she’s a nurse. We should all have a nurse handy. Diane knew what the pain meant in his arms that Saturday and now she knows how special an ash tree can become. Let’s all plant a new ash tree in his memory. Anyone who wants to can write a message to Duane to be buried into the tree’s root as it expands. I can attend and bless the tree but, of course, that involves travel expenses and stipend but we can talk about that later.

Speaking of Saturdays, I have a possible child abuse case. Almost every Saturday, Duane would subject his three young children to a seventeen-minute song played on the radio – 8:00 pm., 93.5FM – written by some drugged-induced guitarist because the song made absolutely no sense. To young children it would seem more like an hour. He attempted to soften this parental infliction with popcorn, but come on – really! It became a Saturday family ritual as often as possible.

(Beginning of “In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida” by Iron Butterfly.)

You thought I was going to play the whole song!

During one of our Salvatorian Seminary/JFK Prep reunions, four of us decided to explore the Main Building, just one more time. We sneak through a basement window and walked those hallowed hallways one last time. Mike Bushman, Mike Macy, Duane and me. Suddenly it occurs to us, “What if we get caught?” (We’re all in our late 30’s and still worried about being caught!) Then it suddenly occurs to us that … Bushman’s a cop, Macy’s a lawyer, Duane’s in maintenance and I finally realize, “I own the place!”

Children, please cover your ears. Can you spell SH__ in church? I only spelled two of the four to be religiously correct. Four letters to describe our gathering together. Four letters that express our grief and frustration of losing the life of a brother, dad, grandfather, two wonderful marriages, life-long friends and how many other titles from his professional career. Today we are filled with all kinds of grieve yet our beautiful faith can one day or some day replace that grieve with God’s hope and peace. God owns it all, you know – hope and peace. We only ask of Him a piece of it to see us through this. Such an untimely death for such a wonderful, quiet and thoughtful man, Duane Schuller.

How do you say “Goodbye?” You may be thinking about that received that phone call with the caller’s cautionary beginning, “Hi, you’re not going to believe this but” or “Hi, are you sitting down now?” as Duane’s sister told me on that Saturday night. Or, those of you who made it to the hospital. That’s a very personal question and is only answered by each of you in your own unique way. Do it through prayer. Do it through your memories. Do it through the consolation and strength that others offer you.

You wanna know about male bonding? I make a surprise visit to Duane and Diane to show off my new Audi convertible. In conversation, I tell Duane that my dad passed away. Duane says, “Why didn’t you call me, I would have gone?” I replied, “You didn’t tell me when your parents died. I would have gone!” That’s called “male bonding.” Can’t beat it.

Grieving is just like finding your own vocation, there is no magical or mystical solution to your tears, your numbness, or your doubts. Or, in my case, just a weeklong case of bold denials and tearful tears every time I read this to myself. Your “Goodbye” need not be its ending-word but a living word about Duane living within your continuing lives. What quality of his can you slowly make your own as we continue our life’s journey? His sly smiles that spoke unspoken paragraphs? His head slightly tilted with eyes firmly on you with unsaid words like, “You’re kidding yourself, just stop it!” His feeble attempt at humor for which I surely surpassed him, hands down? Or, is it the love in his wordless eyes for each of the loves in his life?

For all of us today, I hold out for the last question. “The love in his wordless eyes for each of the loves in his life, including his dedication to hard work.” To all of us to address that question, in different ways, but with that same loving commitment. Nothing, ever can top the last question. Duane showed us through his life how simple and enriching life can be. We’re the ones who so often complicate and muck it up. A simple man, living a simple, wonderful life. A man whose actions spoke louder than his words. (Isn’t that mentioned somewhere in the Bible!?)

I hope you didn’t forget that I talked earlier about vocation. It’s wasn’t priestly life as Duane found out. But he truly and irrevocably uncovered his vocation. That’s truly a gift from God when it happens. It was the land, the woods. It’s wasn’t cows, like his parents, but it was in the same spirit as theirs. The land. All the wood needed to build a safe home to build a family, Mary, Bradley, Leah and Natalie and Diane. The woods surrounding his life and the home he loved. I saw the yearly Christmas trees display that he shared with others and I heard about the ash tree that brought his weary, tired arms to an alarming end.

Diane said that she and Duane never separated without saying, “I love you” to each other. They said that to each other on that Saturday. As Bradley told me, “He died doing what he loved.” That quickness may be a comfort for Duane but is truly difficult for us who did not have the opportunity to say, “I love you.” I never said “I love you” to your dad but I hoped I said in my wordless eyes, like he did, every time we had an enjoyable time together. Years would pass by and I’d pop in to visit. From that beginning handshake to its ending, “Goodbye,” it was as though we had just done the same thing yesterday. “Thank you.” “Thank you, Duane Schuler.”

Oh wait! This is the Catholic Church. Our undying faith tells us both in hope and the promise of everlasting life that we can say, “Thank you, Duane,” and “I love you, Duane” every day of our remaining days.

So, imagine it’s Saturday night. His kids would be in their pj’s. Popcorn popping away. Perhaps a fire crackling away in the fireplace from wood he’s cut. Sitting around the radio, intently listening as though it’s President Roosevelt talking about Pearl Harbor. And that seventeen-minute song, that seventeen-minute song comes to the end. Ready kids?

(Ending of “Iron Butterfly” song.)

Amen.