A student remembers Bernie  / Andrew Kidd (Former student )
I was lucky enough to have Bernie as a one of my professors at Wayne State. He was deceptively quiet and soft-spoken a demeanor which concealed his brilliant intellect and his fiery commitment to the social causes which he believed in. Now that I'm teaching myself I include my own eulogy to Bernie which I deliver to my students when I teach them about ceremonial speeches and epideictic rhetoric. I am proud to have called Bernie a friend as well as a mentor and he is among those I am dedicating my dissertation to. Close

Three Years...  / Arthur Brock (Son)
It has been three years now since you passed away.

You would have enjoyed Obama's campaign and election and provided lively commentary and joyful tears.

You'd be proud of Brook & Timothy, and of your friends for their rallying support of Leslie.

You continue to be dearly missed by all of us. 

Blessings be with you. Close

Two months gone.  / Joan Leininger (loving companion )
Dear Bernie, 

It has been only two months since you left us, but it seems like a year and yet only a moment. I miss you most at sunset time and swear that I saw your face in the moon these past few nights.

I'm seeing Brooke each week and bringing her to my house where she saw you so often . She feels your presence here, as do I. She is growning into a sweet little girl who loves to pull her wagon as we go for walks where you and I walked for so many years.

We love you,
Joan Close

Memories / Pat Stockdale (Sister)
We had lots of years together, and you always made the effort to come to see our family.  Last Christmas you brought Leslie and Brooke to see us.  We had a great time.

I can't quite believe we won't have our every Saturday morning telephone conversations -- including the one before you passed away.

Love, Pat


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We Love You!  / Karen Hoehne (Niece)
Family gatherings will never be the same again.  You were always so full of life and interested in what everyone was doing and thinking.  On every occasion, you would make a point of having a one-on-one discussion with each and every person in attendance, including the kids.  For some reason, you always initiated your discussion with the host/hostess during the busy carving/serving part of the evening.  I think you were just trying to get a rise out of people.

Between your professional endeavors, church, travels, and keeping in touch with family and friends, I don't know how you found your energy.

You were very special and we all miss you!

Ted, Karen, Krissy, and Alyssa Close

A great mentor  / Deanna Sellnow (mentee)
Although I never formally had a class from Dr. Brock, he was a true mentor to me. Thanks for encouraging and supporting my efforts to study music as rhetoric. I hope that I can one day be such a warm guiding light to my students. Close

Bernie, You were my shooting star and love.  / Joan Leininge (loving companion of twenty five years )
Dearest Bernie,  you lighted my life but left too suddenly.  

We met twenty-five years ago, and each year our love grew. When you sold your house and moved near to me, it was wonderful for both of us. You were so happy in retirement living......although you still taught at two universities and Co-Directed a research center.. 

Our travels together all over the world were wonderfui...Asia, Europe, Great Britain, Mexico, Alaska, Hawaii Peurto Ricao and the Carribean. We deighted in them all and made friends wherever we went, with your sense of humor and ability to reach out to anyone you met.

We shared our love of the profession, and this last April were to attend two conferences where you would be honored.  I plan to continue to go as if you were there with me.....and I know you will be. You wouldn't miss those panels and papers on politics for all the world.

I will continue to see the movies that we loved to attend and listen to the jazz that we loved so dearly. I know that you will be there listening and smiling.

I love you,
Joan Close

Bernie's talent  / Donna Fay (friend)
I first met Bernie in 1976 when I was elected Reader at my church. That position involved reading aloud from the Scriptures, among other books, and my inexperience was hampering my confidence in reading aloud. Bernie Brock's name was suggested to me for tutoring and coaching. I went down to Wayne State, and Bernie had me standing in the front of his classroom, with my books laid out on a lectern. Here was the guru of speech and communications and I had to read aloud to him! I was young and nervous about reading aloud to him. He didn't seem to notice. (Or if he did, as I suspect he must have, he didn't let on with so much as a whisker twitch of amusement, lest it unnerve me further.) Bernie had me start in reading, and it came out in a monontone of boring text. Bernie made a few suggestions, all the better to get some animation and life in the reading, and what I added was maybe a raised pitch and volume. Then he suggested that perhaps I might put a little more animation in it. OK, I was sure I'd do it right now: what came out was not exactly what he meant. "Well, certainly Theta Barra has her place in oral readings, but probably not in church," was his comment. I hooted. He could see that I wasn't getting the picture. So he walked up and asked for my Bible, which I gladly turned over to him. But then Bernie started to read. The Bible story came alive, quietly, naturally, conversationally, and with perfect emphasis and animation; not dramatic nor monotonous, not too fast nor too slow. "You are talking with your audience, not reading AT them," he told me. I never forgot his coaching. I went back one more time, and while I wasn't reading like he read, there WAS improvement. By the time I was well into the term of my Readership, people would tell me how much they got out of my reading. I wanted to give them all Bernie's business card. Bernie's coaching was up there with me for every service. I suspect that some version of this story could be multiplied by at least 1000 and still not tell the whole picture of Bernie's gift to us all. Fondly, Donna Fay Close

with loving gratitude  / Verta Driver (friend)
Dear Loree,

 Tom told me about Bernie's passing and it brings back all sorts of memories; the most important is of how much David valued him.

 Two specific instances come to mind.  One was when David had a lecture that just didn't go.  Bernie turned the ideas around - the beginning at the end, the end at the beginning.  Just amazing to see the outcome.

 The other remembrance is of how Bernie helped David in the way he gave his lectures.  He helped David get in touch with the underlying emphasis and intensity of his words.

 Because of those instances, and others, Bernie became very special to me.

 A couple times when we were in the midwest while we were on lecture tours, he visited us at our hotels to help David structure the lectures.  I wanted so much to find Bernie something special to eat, so I got some baklava.  It was the first time I'd ever tased baklava!! Ever since then, Bernie and baclava are synomymous to me.

 He's a very special man and I'm certain that he goes on helping others with Feeling the Christ.  Just like he helped make David's lectures Felt.

 Much love to you and your children.  Tom tells me of how fond he is of your family.

 Verta Driver Close

Thank You, Dad  / Arthur Brock (Son)

Thank you Father for being a playmate, guide, partner and friend.

In my childhood I remember your playfulness, love and desire to provide guidance.

I can see now that in my teen years and young adulthood, in my need to define myself, it was difficult to appreciate much of the gifts you had to give.

You see... I had decided my life was about love, and your life looked like it was about something else...being practical, sensible, timely, professional... things that seemed to have little to do with love.

It wasn't until my later adulthood that I began to understand what an old softy you really are... and how much love and commitment you really had.

Once my own expression of love moved beyond individuals to groups, community, the world, I began to understand the commitment, the focus and integrity that it takes to build something that makes a difference for people and contributes something of value to the world.

Suddenly, these practical, sensible, timely and professional things were not an impediment to expressing love, but rather a critical element to having the integrity to express love in its fullness in the world.

It is from you that I have learned to tackle big things and be able to have the tenacity and follow-through to make them happen. The things that I've created, the communities I've built, the projects delivered, the gifts given... These things I owe to you.

In the end, I realize that much of what I resisted, I have become. And that it is fine because all along, everyone else could see what I couldn't, and they see it now in me. My life isn't about me... It's about the gift of love I have to give.

I love you.

-Arthur
(text was excerpted from artbrock.com, shared w/ Bernie in 2001) Close

Thoughts of Bernie  / Mickki Langston (Friend)

 If you would indeed behold the spirit of death, open your heart wide unto the body of life.
 For life and death are one, even as the river and sea are one.
 
 In the depth of your hopes and desires lies your silent knowledge of the beyond;
 And like seeds dreaming beneath the snow your heart dreams of spring.
 Trust the dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.
 Your fear of death is but the trembling of the shepherd when he stands before the kind whose hand is to be laid upon him in honour.

 For what is it to die but to stand naked in the wind and to melt into the sun?
 And what is it to cease breathing, but to free the breath from its restless tides, that it may rise and expand and seek God unencumbered?

 Only when you drink from the river of silence shall you indeed sing.
 And when you have reached the mountain top, then you shall begin to climb.
 And when the earth shall claim your limbs, then shall you truly dance.

---

Although I was only honored to know Bernie for two years, his loving and gentle presence was truly a blessing. His courageous love continues to be an inspiration.

But what I am most grateful for is the gift he continues to leave us, that of his son, Arthur. One who continues this legacy of open and complete love.

Thank you Bernie, for your love and light. Close

Grateful / Jean Russell (Onet buddy )
I am so sorry for your loss. Sorry for mine too. I never met Bernie in person. We had extended conversations in a virtual community. I feel so sorry for the finite and sudden end of it. I won't have a new conversation with Bernie now. However, I have a rich treasure of comments Bernie made. I am so grateful for them. I am so grateful for this opportunity to reread them and be inspired by his style, his etiquette, his insight. I am so grateful he touched my life and inspired me. I am so grateful that he touched yours too. Close