Still waiting to hear from the residency… I was told I would hear back some time in February, so it is coming up. Although I have (repeatedly) told myself that ultimately everything is in God’s hands, my mind turns toward chaplaincy a lot.
My internship this summer at the hospital was therapeutic. I learned to let go of fears and anxiety. At first, I would be apprehensive not be up to facing tragic circumstances. I worried about being awkward and adding to the pain of a mourning family.
Ironically, the true issue turned out to be about finding available patients who were willing to chat. Once the contact was established, even in a critical context, it would be fluid, essential, natural. Being a chaplain, I realized, was not about acting in a certain way, or saying some specific words, rather about… being there.
- what do people who are sick and dying talk to the student chaplain about?"asked one day a professor of theology to one of his students, a 26 year old chaplain intern. I am quoting here from her wonderful article, written years later. [1]
- Mostly we talk about their families.”
“Do you talk about God?
“Umm, not usually.”
“Or their religion?”
“Not so much.”
“The meaning of their lives?”
“Sometimes.”
“And prayer? Do you lead them in prayer? Or ritual?”
“Well…Sometimes. But not usually, not really.”
Kerry Egan, the student, felt derision creeping into the professor's voice. “So you just visit people and talk about their families?”
“Well, they talk. I mostly listen.”
“Huh.” He leaned back in his chair.
One week later, recalled Kerry, in the middle of a lecture in this professor's packed class, he started to tell a story about a student he once met who was a chaplain intern at a hospital.
“And I asked her, 'What exactly do you do as a chaplain?' And she replied, 'Well, I talk to people about their families.'” He paused for effect. “And that was this student's understanding of faith! That was as deep as this person's spiritual life went! Talking about other people's families!”
The students laughed at the shallowness of the silly student. The professor was on a roll.
“And I thought to myself,” he continued, “that if I was ever sick in the hospital, if I was ever dying, that the last person I would ever want to see is some Harvard Divinity School student chaplain wanting to talk to me about my family.”(…)
Today, 13 years later, I am a hospice chaplain, Kerry goes on. I visit people who are dying... And if you were to ask me the same question - I would give you the same answer. Mostly, they talk about their families. They talk about the love they felt, and the love they gave… Or did not gave… And sometimes, when they are actively dying, they call out to their parents: Mama, Daddy, Mother.
…What I would explain to that professor now, is that people talk to the chaplain about their families because that is how we talk about God. That is how we talk about the meaning of our lives. That is how we talk about the big spiritual questions of human existence.
We don't live our lives in our heads, in theology and theories. We live our lives in our families: the families we are born into, the families we create. This is where we create our lives, this is where we find meaning, this is where our purpose becomes clear.
Family is where we first experience love and where we first give it. It's probably the first place we've been hurt by someone we love, and hopefully the place we learn that love can overcome even the most painful rejection.
This crucible of love is where we start to ask those big spiritual questions, and ultimately where they end…If God is love, and we believe that to be true, then we learn about God when we learn about love. The first, and usually the last, classroom of love is the family.
Sometimes that love is not only imperfect, it seems to be missing entirely. Monstrous things can happen in families….Even in these cases, I am amazed at the strength of the human soul. People who did not know love in their families know that they should have been loved. They somehow know what was missing, and what they deserved as children and adults.
When the love is imperfect, or a family is destructive, something else can be learned: forgiveness. The spiritual work of being human is learning how to love and how to forgive.
We don’t have to use words of theology to talk about God; people who are close to death almost never do. We should learn from those who are dying that the best way to teach our children about God is by loving each other wholly and forgiving each other fully - just as each of us longs to be loved and forgiven by our mothers and fathers, sons and daughters.
Who is your neighbor ? This is a question we read in the Gospels. My neighbor is the one I may walk along in the midst of those oceanic moments where life deeply changes and sometimes ends. My neighbor is the one that leads me to the answers of those essential questions life throws at me.
