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Attendance at two services very revealing MARK GUYDISH OPINION

Saturday November 29, 2008 | 12:00 AM

I wouldn’t know a Baha’i devotional gathering if I barged into one looking for a restroom, even though the core of the religion’s philosophy – unity across faiths and borders – has appeal.

Never attended a Bishop Hoban Lady Argents basketball game during Bob Schuler’s phenomenal run as coach, either, though under his 21-year tenure the team won nearly 72 percent of its games, six league and six division titles, and went to states three times, returning with a victory in 1999.

Yet the two – Baha’i and Schuler – crossed my path quite accidentally this week at the same locale: Wilkes-Barre’s grandly designed St. Nicholas Church.

The ornate house of worship hosted a Thanksgiving interfaith service Tuesday night, a rare chance to hear opening remarks from a Roman Catholic priest, prayers and readings from representatives of the Hindu, Baha’i, Lutheran and Unity Church faiths, sermon by an Episcopal priest, and benediction from a rabbi. ( The Muslim representative didn’t make it due to illness).

A scant 17 hours later, St. Nick’s helped say farewell to Schuler in a funeral Mass concelebrated by four priests before a nearly packed house.

The attendance – or more specifically, the disparity – was the first thing that struck me. The interfaith service drew fewer than 70 people, and that’s estimating generously. The funeral drew at least 200, and that’s almost surely selling the crowd short. Leaders from more than half a dozen faiths get together and they can’t muster enough followers to fill a small chapel, while the eulogy for one man brings in three times more people?

Sad evidence of the old saw that many church “members” only visit for baptisms, weddings and funerals. But the real pity is that both deserved broader mention in the public arena.

Sharing a prayer

Several speakers at the interfaith service alluded to bygone days when such rites occurred in multiple locations throughout the valley. Now there is just one, and the audience has dwindled annually. Too bad. In an era of economic uncertainty and global insecurity, I found it spiritually uplifting and emotionally soothing.. Even agnostics and atheists ought to take comfort at the commingling of different faiths, many of which would never have shared a prayer just 50 years ago.

And as to “Coach” Schuler, well, I only met him once or twice. But I’m betting even brief interactions consistently showed what I saw: A disciplined mind (an accountant by trade) focused on success (see the above basketball record) infused from head to toe with a gentlemanly demeanor.

At an age (76) when most successful people would have sold the business and retired long ago, Schuler kept working, and would have kept coaching but for an abrupt dismissal in 2006 (he deserved better treatment – and a better explanation for that decision).

But most of all, he has been praised repeatedly for the emphasis on “team.” Our own late, great sports writer Jerry Kellar once wrote how Schuler liked to “boast” that the 1999 state championship team lacked a go-to player.

“The Argents,” Jerry observed poignantly, “had about nine of them.”

At the interfaith service, Baha’i representative Kathy Jenkins read a prayer that people “become as the rays of one sun, as the waves of one ocean, and as the fruit of one tree.”

It is through people like Coach Schuler, and efforts like the interfaith service, that such prayers have a chance at fulfillment.

Which is why the disconnected events struck a similar chord for me.

And why both the service and his passing merited more attention.

About the Author

Mark Guydish covers education for the Times Leader. Reach him at (570) 970-7161 or mguydish@timesleader.com.

A West Hazleton native, I worked as a service technician repairing electronic mailing and shipping systems, a bike shop owner and an Emergency Medical Technician (among other jobs) before landing a reporter job at the Times Leader Hazleton Bureau in 1995. I started by covering primarily politics in Hazleton City and outlying municipalities, eventually became "social issues" team leader in the Wilkes-Barre office with the accent on education, and headed the Hazleton Bureau for a spell before returning to full-time reporting, my preferred position. I'm an avid cyclist and rode across the country in 1990, a trip of more than 5,000 miles from New Jersey to Seattle and down the coast to San Francisco. Years in the Boy Scouts made me a life long backpacker and camper, and I've yet to find a better way to enjoy the quiet lure of winter snow than cross country skiing.

Mark also writes a regular blog for timesleader.com.