Father Derek Wiechmann shares how God and community held his family together during crisis
My life changed forever on Feb. 11, 2012. It was a cold day, but the sun was shining brightly. In many ways, it was a normal day for February. This normal day turned into a day that will always be engrained in my memory. I was 21 years old and was in my third year of seminary at Immaculate Heart of Mary Seminary in Winona. I was home for the weekend. We had a free weekend once a semester so I took advantage of going back to my family’s dairy farm near St. Rosa to spend the weekend with family.
That morning, I had taken soup that my mom had made to a neighbor who was dying of cancer. It was a difficult visit, seeing her suffer the pains that fighting cancer brings, but I was inspired by her faith. When I returned home, we had lunch and I laid down for a quick early afternoon nap. Before I did that, my brother Craig and I were wrestling, as we often did, and he gave me a big hug. I wish I had known that was the last hug I would ever receive from him.
After waking up from my nap, my dad came in from the barn and said “Derek, I can’t find Craig. I think he might be up in the silo.” The haylage silo had a tendency in the winter to have build up on the walls, and so someone needed to go up there with a pickaxe. A job I’ve done countless times.
Craig, though, being in a hurry, turned on the unloader so that he could feed the haylage chunks into the auger and didn’t tell anyone he was going to do that. Dad would never have let him do it; he always warned us to be careful. I fearfully crawled the silo and found Craig there, his leg wrapped in the auger. I immediately went to him, but found that he had passed, likely very quickly, as his phone was still in his pocket. Words cannot describe the pain this event caused my family and me, but thankfully we were not alone.
Our faith truly guided us through. The funeral Mass, celebrated by Benedictine Father Roger Klassen, was as memorable as Craig’s death. Father Roger’s words were exactly what our family and community needed. Even though we were still in the midst of shock and grief, he instilled hope within us: that death is not the end. It is just the beginning of something new. The funeral Mass brought us hope, believing that Jesus, who becomes present to us in the Eucharist, is ever-present to our loved ones that have passed.
The community that we lived in was amazing. That same night of his passing, neighbors gathered at the house just to be with us, bringing food over, praying and crying with us. In fact, for weeks after, there was a constant stream of people stopping by the farm, extending their support and love. These things I will never forget.
In our deepest moments of grief, God was ever-present, and so every part of it had value. Nothing was wasted, nothing was lost. Every moment of pain, every doubt, every tear. All of it was within God’s watchful and close care.
Father Derek Wiechmann is the pastor of All Called to Christ Area Catholic Community for the St. Cloud parishes of St. Anthony, Holy Spirit and Christ Church Newman Center.