Nota Bene: Brian had just put the finishing touches on an album called "Breathing," thus my thematic emphasis on "breath." People have been asking for my remarks so here they are.  This small memorial took place at "the family compound," which my parents bought in 1970 and Brian and Joyce purchased in 1999.

Brian Robert Doerksen entered his “let’s get out of the water and start breathing” stage on Nov 17th, 1965.  And when he did, he did it in typical dramatic fashion. 

A previous iteration of this “let’s get out of the water process” had produced an elder brother but no drama, just a bundle of perfect contentedness and first-born bliss. :)

But what happened with Brian was only the first in a long line of "up-stagings" which the elder brother would need to get used to, so much so that in later life, elder brother was more known, not by his given names, but by his relationship to Brian.  “Oh, that’s Brian’s older brother.” 

As many of you know, shortly after he was born, his/our mother, went into a coma through loss of blood, a coma that physicians saw as the end of the road for her.  But amazingly, miraculously, she survived and after a couple of weeks in the hospital was reunited with Brian. 

This was written up at the time as medical miracle of sorts; it certainly was “our family’s St. Paul miracle.”  When Brian ended up in the hospital, at St. Paul’s a few weeks ago, some of us were praying for a 2nd St. Paul’s miracle. 

Because of this traumatic event my mother was unable to have more children, so it became the two brothers, unusually small for Mennonite families of the time.  Growing up in this place there was adventure to be had, cows to pester, frogs to catch and balls to throw and catch.  Together we fidgeted through interminable church services, often twice on Sundays, slept in the same room, discovered music together and read the same books 

This changed in junior high when, as often happens in homes where there’s only two siblings close in age, in our case only one grade, we began to walk different paths from what felt like sheer necessity. 

As we began to walk to the beat of our own drums, I marvelled at Brian’s ease in relationships; his confidence, and his deep commitment.  Meeting the girl you would spend the rest of your life together in grade nine? Not many of us do that. 

As the years compressed into decades, we were like two vines on a trellis; we would grow apart and then find that our paths were intersecting and looping around each other once again.  

And in those times, I would find Brian curious, listening, non-judgmental to my difference. 

This has been a great gift to me. As he sang about in many of his songs, “faithful love” was Brian to the core. 

Brian was never, to me at least, a Christian worship songwriter.  He did act that role, to be sure, but the fairy dust that infected his craft was the ability to connect words of faith with our common desire and longing.  There is a deep, romantic feeling underneath his lyrics, the feeling of the tune itself. 

I'll always remember how, when he played a song called "Eternity" shortly after the death of a friend in a climbing accident and at the same time as the birth of our second son, he was able to capture the depth of my/our hopes, dreams, and sadness. 

I've never liked much Christian worship music, but his always managed to touch me deeply. 

As he matured as a songwriter—and I would commend to you his latest body of work, Breathing, which I've been listening to a lot as you might imagine—the language gets less objective and more subjective, connecting to a common humanity, a connection to the love and gratitude that is at the core of the Christian faith at its best, but also just to the yearning common to so much of humanity. 

Brian lived this way with his family but also in his connection and commitment to worthy causes, especially to people who were hurting in prison, people in recovery, people struggling to find a place because they were not deemed contributors. 

When I was asked by my Bishop to reboot a more inclusive St. Matthew, Abbotsford, Brian and Joyce quietly joined our congregation once a month to support the work, I experienced it as Brian's love for me.   

It was an act that could have damaged his career in an increasingly shrill environment.  He stood in the place where his deep feeling connected with people who felt pushed aside.  I’m so proud of the things he stood for and what he did about it. 

Brian’s sense of responsibility to his family meant he never took it easy for long.  He provided, he encouraged, he enjoyed, he loved, right till the end. 

His death leaves a large hollow spot in my heart; conversations that won’t happen, not growing old together, the sadness that comes from knowing that Joyce has lost her best friend and love, for Rachel, Esther, Ben, Joy, Mercy, Isaiah, and Luke; for Dad; for all of you who were close to him. 

In the end it was simply Brian’s breath that remained.  I don’t think it’s an accident that in the Hebrew and the Christian Tradition, in the Indigenous worldview, God is Spirit; the word is the same one as breath in both Hebrew and Greek. 

Once Brian’s breath stopped, he became one with that Breath, the Divine Life; he now experiences the Hope of the Nations, for he is with the Faithful One.  We love you Brian, I will miss you and treasure you always.