Let the Little Children Come to Me

         I was overjoyed on Thursday when I got the honor and the privilege of baptizing my first baby.  As chaplains, we rarely get to even see the healthy, living babies.  It makes sense that we as chaplains don't see them often: parents are in awe and amazement over holding a newborn in their hands for the first time and certainly would want to be with just family; some families have a church home or at least a church they know where they will get their child baptized; plus, hospitals have such a quick turn around after birth that there’s not really time to stop and think, “Hmm, maybe a visit from the chaplain would be nice.”  So when I got called to baptize a perfectly healthy 6 hour old baby, it brought such joy to my heart.  There is nothing in the world quite like looking at one of God’s most recent creations and saying to him, “Be at peace. Christ is with you forever.”

         I was still soaring on cloud 9 over that experience when I went into work today.  I received a call from the nurse on the postpartum floor.  This time, no baptism; this time, a blessing.  The baby was born and died at 20 weeks gestation.  I went up to the unit and prepared myself for the blessing.  In our hospital (and perhaps the way many hospitals do it), we bless deceased babies with holy water that is placed in a shell and poured over the baby’s head.  The shell is small and does not hold much water, but the babies are so tiny that it is enough water to cover the forehead.  I did the water blessing for the child, as well as placing the mark of the cross on the baby’s forehead, symbolizing that Christ is with him forever.  I grieved with the mother – there are just no answers to such a difficult loss.

          The words of Matthew 19:14 kept coming to mind, when Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”  In seminary, one of my professors warned me of society’s 'romanticization' of this text.  I think there’s some truth to that – I’ve certainly seen the images of Jesus carrying around a fluffy, smiling baby lamb as the blue-eyed children run to his feet.  But here in this moment, holding this tiny baby, it didn’t feel romanticized at all.  It gave me chills; it brought me joy; it brought me sadness; it brought me one step deeper into the mystery of God, the fragility of our lives, and the silence of deep and agonizing mourning.

          The prayer for this baby sounded a little different than the prayer for the baptism two days prior.  I used a prayer that I keep stuffed inside my tiny Bible for moments like this.  The prayer reads: “May the grace of God surround you through the warmth and love of family and friends, and may you not feel alone.  May God grant you assurance that your life has made a difference and that you are loved.  May God bless your journey from this life to what lies beyond.  May the Spirit of God go with you and grant you a peaceful passage.  And may we meet you again in heaven.  Amen.”

           As I left the room, I heard the tiny, innocent cry of a healthy newborn next door as the baby’s mother tried to feed her.  The mother on one side of the wall struggles to nurse her child; the mother on the other side of the wall struggles with knowing which funeral home to choose and whether to bury or cremate her child.  The silence of death and the wails of life happening at the same time.

           In these moments, I have to remember that Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me.”  At the same time, yet in different ways, I imagined Jesus’ hand reaching out for both of these precious children.  “For it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.”  Thanks be to God.

Remember

I used to dread theology class.  I remember looking at the course schedule when I started at Columbia Seminary and being nervous that theology was one of the only classes in seminary that lasted an entire year instead of just a semester.  My brain works well with math, with rules, with concrete ideas.  I loved taking Greek and Hebrew and did well in both subjects.  Theology, on the other hand, was about abstract ideas, uncertainties, and small discrepancies that held worlds of different meanings.  I would read every page of the assigned theology reading and still not have a grasp on the subject.  I would sit in discussions with my peers and find that no matter how much we debated, we always left the room with no more answers, only more questions.  I dreaded taking my theology ordination exam, yet ended up with a higher grade on that ord than any of the other subjects…God’s humor astounds me.

I was thankful when I began hospital work because unlike being a parish pastor, I would finally be able to put theology behind me and get on with life.  Silly me.  What I found was just the opposite – theology comes to life in the hospital.  Theology is more important to me now than it ever has been before.  I now see its relation to every person, to every situation, to every day.  It is no longer just the theology of 16^th century theologians or feminist theologians or liberationist theologians.  It is the theology of each person’s story in the hospital.  It is seeing how Christ’s death and resurrection fit into people’s lives when they take their last breath on earth.  It is wondering where God’s comfort lies in the midst of human suffering, cancer, unexpected diagnoses, and death.  It is wondering what it means to worship a relational God and how we as people live in relationship both with God and one another.  For me, it is recognizing that it is only by the grace of God that I can wake up each day and gain energy from the things I experience at work.

Our deepest convictions and theologies come out of our stories and our lives.  These stories are sacred not despite our brokenness, but in our brokenness.  One of our supervisors taught us that our stories are sacred because we are created by God and God speaks to us through our life stories.  When we are able to share our stories, we are given a sense of community and commonality among all people.  Therefore it is crucial that we remember our story, that we claim our story, and that we tell our story.  No one’s life story is greater than another’s, even if we live in a culture that tells us otherwise.  The man selling newspapers on the side of the road has just as sacred of a story as the celebrities who make the front page of those newspapers.  The CEO of a company has just as important of a story to tell as the person who empties the trashcan in the CEO’s office each day.

So how do we continue to tell our story?  We have to start by remembering it and claiming it in our lives.  Through the Old Testament, God tells the Hebrew people over and over to remember.  Every time they started to lose hope and power, they needed to remember their story and from where they came.  Psalm 139 cries out in the suffering of the Israelites as they remembered Zion.  When Christ broke bread with his disciples, he told them, “Do this and remember me.”  Throughout our lives, we are told to remember our baptisms and the claim God has on each of our lives.  We are people who are called to remember.  Remember our stories; remember our joys and our sufferings; and remember that our lives are sacred as we continue to write them.  So remember the stories of the Bible and the gospel message – they will continue to play an important role throughout your life.  But just as importantly, I encourage you to remember your story and see that through the messiness and the hurt, the joy and the laughter, God has written a beautiful, unrepeatable story that continues to write itself each day.

The Greatest Gift of All

People might say that greatest gift of all is Jesus…or having a child…or surviving cancer…or getting an iPhone 4 .  But hey, if I don’t put a catchy title to my post, how can I expect people to read it??  So for the sake of the moment and the intention of this blog, I am here to say that sometimes, especially in the hospital, the greatest gift you can give someone is the gift of listening.  For me, there is a difference between “hearing” and “listening.”  I think of hearing as the physical act of being able to hear the audible sounds of another person.  Listening, however, implies that deep connection and understanding with another and the ability to be right there in the moment.  I think we hear others all day: in the office, in passing, at meal times, during family time.  But how much time in the day are we listening to others?

In our didactic this week, we heard a quote by Fredrick Buechner, an American writer and Presbyterian minister.  Buechner says, “Be kind enough to others to listen, beneath all the words they speak…maybe we can help bring holiness to birth both in them and in us.”  As Buechner says, we need to listen not just to the words themselves, but to what lies beneath those words.  That is when we can find the truest meaning of what we are saying.  As chaplains, we are taught not just to listen to the words of a patient, but to listen to the unspoken language and see if we can crack into the depth of the person.  This is where some of our deepest connections and discoveries take place.  What might you learn from someone else by listening to his/her story?

Today I visited a man in his 60s who was just diagnosed with cancer of the spine.  As I was leaving, he grabbed my hand, began to cry and choked out, “Thank you for listening to me, chaplain.”  I realized that, prior to the closing prayer, I had only said about five words to this man in the whole visit.  But the man didn’t need words – he needed someone to listen as he talked about his fears: fears about cancer, how he will pay his medical bills, whether or not he’ll be able to go back to work, how he’ll be able to take care of his wife after this diagnosis.  And then I realized that listening is a gift that I can give every person I encounter at the hospital.  It is a gift without dollar value, yet it is priceless.  We live in a busy world – a world that is so occupied in keeping up with itself that it doesn’t have time to have meaningful conversation or time to get to know one another.  I think about the times I have said, “How are you?” to people in passing knowing that they’ll say, “Fine, and how are you?”  And I’ll say, “Fine, thanks.”  But in actually, my day may have been absolutely awful.  Yet, I fall back to the default response: “Fine.”  Have you ever stopped to ask someone, “No really, how are you?”  You may be surprised with what you will hear.

In truly listening to someone, we are saying “What you are saying is important to me” and in turn saying, “You are important to me.”  Chaplains aren’t called to patients’ rooms to solve their problems, calm them down, or preach to them.  We are called to their rooms to listen to them.  If you truly listen and trust the patients, you will find that they will be able to discover their own answers to their problems.  They will calm themselves down.  They may even learn something about their relationship with God through the conversation.  But they may not be able to do that without first being given the gift of listening. 

So enjoy all the gifts you are given in your life and continue to offer your gifts to those around you.  But remember to always take the time to offer others one of the most precious gifts in the world: the gift of listening.

'Better than a Hallelujah' by Amy Grant

Better than a Hallelujah

I love listening to the lyrics of songs and seeing how they tie into my life.  It always amazes me when I can hear a song and think that the artist must be singing directly to me.  Music is such a wonderful way to connect to others.  Every now and then when I’m in my car, I hear the song “Better than a Hallelujah” by Amy Grant.  The lyrics to this song have always been beautiful, but now that I’m working as a chaplain, they carry a new meaning for me.  For those of you who haven’t heard this song, here are the lyrics:

God loves a lullaby
In a mother’s tears in the dead of night
Better than a hallelujah sometimes.
God loves a drunkards cry,
The soldiers plea not to let him die
Better than a hallelujah sometimes.

The woman holding on for life,
The dying man giving up the fight
Are better than a hallelujah sometimes
The tears of shame for what's been done,
The silence when the words won't come
Are better than a hallelujah sometimes.

Better than a church bell ringing,
Better than a choir singing out.

We pour out our miseries
God just hears a melody
Beautiful the mess we are
The honest cries of breaking hearts
Are better than a hallelujah.

I think about how many people I see every day, particularly family members who are there with a patient, become frustrated with their own tears.  They say, “I’m sorry that I’m crying” or “I’m trying to be strong for him and then I’ll get the tears out later” or “She has enough things going on right now, she doesn’t need to be worrying about me being upset, too.”  These statements break my heart.  Why is it that tears have such a negative connotation?  I think one answer is our society: we are pushed to be strong, fearless, almost robotic in our actions and that crying is weak, feminine, and even embarrassing.  Men, especially, are told to man up, be strong, and not to show their emotions.  How did tears, sorrow and emotions get such a bad rap??  The honest cries of breaking hearts are better than a hallelujah.

Here are some things I say/do when someone at the bedside apologizes for crying:  Sometimes I say, “You don’t need to apologize…tears are a very normal reaction to what’s going on.”  Sometimes I turn their own words back on them and have them ponder whether tears are really showing weakness or if they actually show honesty, vulnerability and love toward the patient.  I have told people who are mourning the sudden loss of a loved one, “Your tears are precious to God.”  When a loved one dies and a family member ponders about their tears, I sometimes tell them something one of my friends from seminary taught me: “We only grieve those things we truly love.”  The answer that drives me crazy is when friends, families and sometimes strangers say to those who are mourning, “This was God’s will, you can’t question it” or “God won’t give you more than you can handle, so don’t cry.”  I really wrestle theologically with this mindset.  When I see a child lying brain dead in the PICU, an adult diagnosed with an aggressively spreading cancer, or parents be told their baby did not live through childbirth, I know God is right there in our crying and our mourning, in our silence and our suffering.  The silence when the words won’t come is better than a hallelujah.

I imagine that a mother who has lost a child, a person who feels isolated and trapped in a substance abuse problem, or a soldier who has watched his fellow soldier die before his/her eyes would find a deep connection with this song.  We pour out our miseries and God just hears a melody.  I think it gives permission for the person to grieve when the rest of the world says, “Enough already.”  Tears do not show weakness nor do they move us farther away from God.  Rather, I believe in our deepest sorrows and tears, God is right there is the moment.  I even believe God feels sorrow with us and weeps with us in the unexplainable tragedies in life.  The weeping, the wailing, and the shouts to God saying, How could you let this happen?? are more precious than a hallelujah.  So if you’re mourning, don’t let others stifle your tears, tell you weeping shows weakness, or try to pull you out of the hell you’re in.  Let the tears fall; let the silence of unanswered questions be heard; and let the world know that sometimes our lives suddenly crash in on us…and even God weeps for that.

How beautiful the mess we are.

First Impressions

I hate first impressions.  I do not trust my first impressions of people and I hate feeling like someone else is making a first impression of me.  It is an uncomfortable feeling.  One of the chaplains at the hospital brought to our attention that we really are in the “first impressions” business.  We walk into our room and immediately the patient makes a judgment on us, just as we make judgments of them.  We can all pretend and say, “I don’t judge people on first impressions,” but I would argue that it’s inevitable.  It’s a part of our inner-being, even if our thoughts can change in the first 30 seconds of a visit.  So here are some of the more interesting first impressions of me that patients have verbalized:  They sometimes confuse me for the social worker.  Must be because I’m female.  Sometimes they ask me if I’m still in training.  Must be because I look 12.  I have even been confused for a nun.  Probably because the patient was Catholic.  Some people say, “How cute that you’ve been able to find your calling at such a young age.”  Yes, cute...I really love that one.  My favorite was the time when one woman said, “Oh, I must not have been clear in speaking with my nurse…I was asking for a priest.”  She then teared up and began to quiver until she burst into tears for the remainder of the visit.  It was so awkward it was almost funny.  I just sat there to give her the space to open up (that’s what we’re trained to do) until I felt like she was going to have a nervous breakdown, so I told her I’d find a priest to come see her.

Most of my visits don’t involve any awkwardness, but they’re not as fun to talk about.  Usually they result in the patient saying, “Oh hi, chaplain, I’m so thankful you came.”  Sometimes they’ll ask me to sit down.  Sometimes they’ll take my hand and hold it tightly.  Sometimes they are confused and don’t know what a chaplain is (so they start rambling off their blood pressure and prescription list to me).  Sometimes they begin to share stories or they stare into my eyes looking for the hope that they’ve lost in themselves.  I guess I just wonder how chaplains are viewed outside the realm of the chaplain’s world.  I have often heard people say we are representatives of God going into the rooms.  That sure brings a heavy responsibility!  I find peace knowing that I am not bringing the presence of God into a room, but that God is already present in the room and that I enter into that holy space with the patient and with God.

So I suppose, as much as I hate it, that I will continue to develop first impressions when I meet people.  But my hope is that I can educate myself to know that first impressions aren’t always right.  After all, I am not the stereotypical chaplain: I am young and female.  But I am not a student: I am an ordained minister.  And I am not a social worker or a nun: I am a chaplain.

Life’s Greatest Mystery is…

In my first blog, I mentioned about my fear of hospitals and more specifically, my fear around death.  I wish I could say I’m no longer afraid of dying, but I’d be partially lying to you…and myself.  That is why I believe that life's greatest mystery is death.

While reminiscing on some of my first childhood memories, I remember how I would sit around and ponder life, death, God, where babies came from, etc.  Just for humor’s sake, I will humiliate myself and let you know my thoughts on these topics.  First: where babies come from.  I thought that when a woman wanted to get pregnant, she would begin to eat fried chicken (including the bones) and spinach for every meal.  The swallowed bones would begin to form into bones that would be the skeleton of the human and the spinach would provide the nutrients.  You know how parents always say, “Eat your vegetables”?  Well, spinach was the token vegetable.  I even wondered at one point why God made men if women were the ones who created, birthed, and raised a child.  But I digress. :) Second: I remember picturing God as a big swirling mass in the sky and becoming confused when I read a picture book about the Christmas story with baby Jesus and his father, Joseph.  I remember pondering the nativity pictures while sitting on the kitchen floor at my childhood home on Paige Street and wondering if God was actually a man since all the nativity pictures showed Jesus’ father as a man (who I later learned was Joseph, not God).  Third: I remember thinking I had the ability to live forever.  I would say to myself, “Whenever my body gets really, really sick and tired, I will just choose to keep breathing.”  I thought people died because they make the choice to stop breathing, and I didn’t want to make that one.  Well, I eventually learned where babies come from…and that God is not a man…but one thing is still a mystery to me: death.

When I was in sixth grade, I remember getting done with something at church and my mom coming up to me saying, “Karen [not person’s real name] is in the chapel and asked if you three kids would come and see her.”  (Brief background: Karen was a lady in our church whose son had died in his early 40’s.  Karen asked my mom if we kids would go to the chapel to see her during her son’s viewing).  Mom assured me, “We’ll just go in for a minute and you can stay right at the door if you want to.”  Being caught up in the rush, I agreed to go see Karen, not knowing exactly what I should be expecting.  Again, I had thought about death as a child, but mostly about how I would avoid dying by continuing to breathe and about what heaven would be like rather than what our bodies looked like after we died.  I walked into the chapel and felt like I had been punched in the stomach with what I saw: an open casket with black and white framed photos resting on it showing the ancestry of this man, a big floral arrangement, and death.  I wanted to bolt, but right at that moment, Karen said, “Go on up and say goodbye to Jim [again, not real name].  It would mean so much to me.”  We walked up and I remember the pain in my stomach moving up towards my throat, then into my eyes, and I just wanted to burst out crying, but not out of sadness.  No, they were tears of utter fear and terror.  Luckily my mom said, “Jim, may you rest in peace,” because I knew if I so much as opened my mouth, I would’ve wailed or screamed or done something terribly embarrassing.  I kept it together until we walked out of the room, but then felt my body shaking and tears streaming.  Is there any way to prepare yourself for the first moment of facing death, even if it is someone you’ve never met?  I’m not talking about the beautifully painted picture of heaven and going home to the Lord, but the side of death that is left here on this earth.  The part we don’t want to talk about.  And in this story, I opted to not talk to anyone about it for several years.  But every night for years, when I closed my eyes, I would see this man – the images and smells haunted me.  He was in my dreams and caused me to wake up in cold sweats every now and then.

I still can’t understand death…no one here on earth can fully understand it.  We don’t even describe death in the same way.  Some people say “s/he died.”  Others say “passed away.”  In the hospital, the medical staff says “expired.”  Some people may say “s/he has joined the Church Triumphant” or “s/he has gone home to be with the Lord.”  Personally, I prefer the word “died.”  I think it captures the finality of it…perhaps this is why I focus so heavily on the earthly side of death.  It is the way I describe death and the way I have witnessed it in my life.

I’m still getting used to death, even being in my residency.  But maybe it’s ok for me to be afraid of death…specifically earth’s side of death.  Perhaps God is ok with me fearing this unknown.  It is part of the mystery of death that I believe God intended at the birth of creation – after all, we are not God or even gods, but humans, and therefore are not able to know all.


Maybe someday I will get to that thin veil between life and death…I will see what’s on the other side…I will have the choice to keep on breathing like I wanted to do as a child or to let go of this earthly life, die, and move into the arms of God.  I hope and imagine that the choice will be pretty simple.