William Conwell Spong
November 2, 1933 -- February 3, 2004

John Shelby Spong's remarks about Brother Will at the reception following the funeral

Brotherly love is a strange concept. It is so often marked by intense rivalry and little affection. One thinks of biblical brothers -- Cain who killed Abel, Jacob who cheated Esau out of his birthright or Joseph who was sold into slavery by his brothers. But when one admires and loves one's brother it is a special relationship indeed. Will Spong and I shared that specialness.

Until his death I had never lost a sibling. I am not unfamiliar with death. I know the particular grief that comes when one buries one's wife. I have also lost parents, a brother-in-law, a close cousin and special friends, but losing my only brother was for me a new kind of grief.

His death came so suddenly. He had defeated some serious illnesses. Last November he had broken an ankle, frustrating yes, but not life threatening. So I was quite unprepared for a phone call from his son. "Uncle Jack," said my nephew and namesake, "I've got some bad news." "What's up John?" I responded as I began to raise my guard against fear. "Your brother did not wake up this morning. There was no sign of struggle. We presume it was a heart attack."

The pain was severe. The sense that this can't be so was overwhelming. Denial is always the first defense against a harsh reality. He was the youngest member of our family of origin. It seems unfair that the one born last would die first. But life has never been fair.

Will was both my brother and my soul mate. We had gone from being rivals, competing against each other, to depending on each other for a strength that was mutual and a friendship that was rare. It is easy to chart the reason for this change. Our father died when Will was only nine and I was twelve. We did have a sister, but at age 14 she was like a grownup. I bet even Cain and Abel would have worked things out if Adam had died. I learned what it meant to be the "big brother" in a vulnerable family. I was his protector. I ran interference for him. I advised him with the kind of worldly wisdom that only twelve year olds possess in abundance. I became the confrontational brother who smashed open closed doors so that he could walk through with his inestimable charm, thus setting a pattern for the rest of our lives.

Will and I followed similar career paths, but in very different ways. I never wanted to be anything but a priest. It was as if I was guided or even compelled by some invisible radar. For Will it was a bit more circuitous. We were both active in our church in Charlotte, going to Sunday school, singing in the boy choir. We each served as the president of the Youth Group, the senior acolyte and were in turn chosen to preach the Youth Sunday Sermon. After Will had delivered the Youth Sermon as a high school senior, a well-intentioned lady congratulated him by saying: "Son, are you going to follow in your big brother's footsteps?" It was not a wise question and Will's response shocked her: "Hell no lady," he said, "I intend to make some of my own!" Well he did just that and he did it magnificently.

Under pressure from me and over the active opposition of our mother who did not want her baby to leave home, Will followed me to the University of North Carolina and then to the Theological Seminary in Virginia to prepare for the priesthood. He was ordained in 1959. I, his older brother, had presided over his marriage and was deeply touched when he asked me to preach at his ordination. It would be the last time I was ever in the position to give him good advice. We served churches geographically close in North Carolina for a few years, but he never enjoyed congregational life as much as I did. He was always a people person not an administrator. Yet he was enormously creative. Active in the Youth Ministry of the diocese, he developed a curriculum for the sex education of teenagers. It was quite provocative for the Bible Belt of the South in the early 60's, so there was much controversy. Since I was the better-known Spong in the diocese at that time I got most of his hate mail. Years later I would return the favor.

It was a life-changing event that redirected his career into the most intensely people oriented part of Christian ministry. It occurred on a warm spring afternoon at a Pony League baseball game for boys 12-15. Will was there to watch some kids he knew from his church. He walked over to talk to the lad in the on deck circle. The opposing pitcher was a southpaw with a blazing fastball. The batter was a right-handed hitter whose slow bat was clearly over-matched. Swinging late, however, he managed to catch the ball on the sweet spot of the bat and sent a screaming drive, foul down the first base line, striking Will in his left eye. In an instant the sight from that eye was gone. It was an agonizing moment for him and for those of us who loved him. For weeks I would close my left eye while reading, or driving just to try to embrace the experience that he was having. I always knew I could reopen my eye, but his was forever closed.

He sank deeply into that experience observing all of the steps in the grieving process that normally mark trauma, but in the dark night of his soul, he found a depth and a direction that he never abandoned. He told me more than once that if he could have his eye back, but would have to sacrifice the person he had become, he would gladly lose the eye again. It was little things that brought him through like the kid who saw his black eye patch and said: "Mister, are you a real pirate?" "No," said Will, quick as a flash, "I work for the Van Heusen Shirt Company!" Those our age will know what he meant.

In this tragedy Will turned his life toward people in need and sought a career in pastoral care. It was like duck finding water or 'brer' Rabbit finding his briar patch. Undergoing a long and rigorous training process to receive accreditation, he entered his new vocation with gusto, becoming chaplain at the Duke University Medical Center. From there he moved to be Professor of Pastoral Theology at the Episcopal Theological Seminary of the Southwest, and later founding the Austin Counseling Center. It was quite a professional ride for an incredibly gifted human being. He was the best I have ever known in his field. He certainly made footprints of his own.

We did not see each other as frequently after he moved to Austin, but our relationship did not need lots of maintenance. When we did see each other, it was as if no time had elapsed.

Will was always my family's pastor. He was the 'priest presenter' at my side when I was consecrated a bishop and the preacher at the service in which I was installed as the Bishop of Newark. It was the kind of sermon that only a brother could have delivered. His words laid me open to a sense of intense vulnerability, but in such a loving way. He made the people see the humanity of the one the church so quickly covers in the vestments of control, power and authority. He presided over the marriages of two of our daughters, then he sustained me through my wife's long and fatal illness, preaching at her funeral, bearing my pain while transforming it. He and I, along with our sister Betty, who had been our mother's primary care giver, walked together through our mother's death at the ripe old age of 92. That experience brought a flood of memories, mundane to most but to me etched indelibly now in my consciousness.

Two years earlier we had gathered to celebrate her 90th birthday, at which time she and Will rolled out a grand piano to play a duet. The song they chose to play was poignant. Its words were these: "There's nothing left for me, of things that used to be. I live in memories among my souvenirs." That moment illumines this day with a new sweetness.

Will and I entered retirement with astonishingly similar amounts of enthusiasm. We saw this stage of life as a time to redirect one's priorities and to step away from those necessary parts of institutional maintenance that had always grated on our souls. For Will that was faculty turf wars, committee meetings and papers to grade. For me it was House of Bishops' meetings, conflicts between vestries and rectors and endless hours in an automobile. We engaged with new fervor what we loved best. For Will it was counseling -- intense and meaningful one to one relationships -- designed to enhance life. For me it was writing and lecturing designed to open minds, to free spirits and to expand life.

We had one other graceful and life-giving serendipity in common. Both of us remarried and knew the wondrous experience of learning to live again and to love again as we entered the sunset years of life. We treasured the joy the other found in his wife.

We grew even closer in those years, talking more frequently on the phone. My lecturing career often took me to Texas and we often managed to get together. Our wives shared in our closeness and bonded with each other. The four of us planned a vacation trip together in 2005, when I would begin to cut back on my career. This trip was to be unencumbered by pending responsibilities. We would celebrate our marriages, careers and our lives together. Now this will not be, but all was not lost because we each found much joy just in anticipation.

What is it like to lose a brother? It is something like losing a close friend, but it is so much more. It is like losing a person you have known since your mother brought him home from the hospital and it began to dawn on you that he was going to stay. It means losing one you remember watching as he learned how to walk and talk and one with whom you have shared adventures that would rival those of Tom Sawyer. It is like losing a colleague who lives inside your vision, who rejoices in your triumphs as you do in his and being present with each other when life turns dark. It is like losing a piece of yourself and wondering if that void will ever heal. It is like seeing something wonderful inside yourself being suddenly transformed from a warm reality, first into darkness and then into being a warm and glowing memory.

As the older brother I normally entered each new experience of life first. Now, however, in the greatest adventure of all into the unknown, Will has grabbed the lead. My destiny is to follow him. In his death, however, he has given me one further incredible gift. It is the gift of coming to recognize how much I loved this brother. The aching void that I now feel can be measured only by the wonderful relationship that once was there. Shallow relationships create shallow voids. Will has left me with an interior Grand Canyon! Yes, it hurts, but I would not trade that hurt for anything in the world because I know how that Grand Canyon was formed. For the intensity of his absence is formed by the intensity of his former presence. That is the gift I treasure and it is his ultimate gift to me.

John Shelby Spong