Chaplaincy

The final requirement for my master’s degree was to work in a clinical setting for eleven weeks as a chaplain intern.  Entering into a hospital setting just four months after my mom’s passing filled me with anxiety, uncertainty and trepidation; but, I needed to complete the requirement if I wanted to move forward with my future goals.  I was carrying with me grief, sadness, exhaustion and doubt; and I worried about how I was going to navigate an environment that houses tremendous suffering in the midst of my own sorrow and dark night.  The journey of CPE is a cyclical process of patient care, reflection, writing, round table discussion, insights returning back to patient care.  We spent a significant portion of time processing the experience and confronting personal presuppositions, theological assumptions and internal responses.  Questions of theodicy are theory for some, a much more significant reality for others.  On life’s continuum there is no rhyme or reason why it appears that some individuals skate through life with only minor challenges; and others seem to repeatedly face the effects of evil on an exponential scale.  A hospital setting is the great leveler and suffering is the great equalizer.      

Several individuals who know me well have watched as I wrestled with the pain and fall out of years of repressed trauma.  During this season I have examined everything I have ever believed including the question, is God a sadistic sovereign intentionally ‘allowing’ evil for some broader purpose that we can’t or won’t see; or is God a benevolent being that loves humanity with every microcosm of its existence?  A Divine being whose passion is so far beyond the limits of human comprehension, and whose mercy, grace and kindness drives it to its ‘metaphorical’ knees in sorrow and tears over the pain that humanity is suffering under?   Working as a chaplain is demanding; as if it is not enough to carry your own personal pain; you sit across from patients at their most vulnerable.  Watching their suffering can be agonizing at times.  Stories of premature baby’s deaths or sitting in the suffering of a thirty-four year old mother of six; as she faces stage four cancers, even after surviving a life as the daughter of an addicted mother turn prostitute, breaks one’s heart into a million little pieces.  There is NOTHING fair about this life.  The randomness in which its horror visits sometimes feels like it wants to overcome and swallow up any vestige of hope. 

Questions of how I was to present the love of God in the midst of that kind of pain – a love of God I’m unsure of, filled many reflections.  Theological questions born out of difficult encounters led to even more complicated inquiries.  After one particular encounter with a schizophrenic gentleman, I asked who God is to the mentally ill.  Questions of whether or not they may be prophets among us filled my mind.  Do they see and experience life normally or are we the delusion?  This seems reasonable to ask when looking at the various prophets and the extremes they took to bring what we define as God’s message to Israel.  If they were walking among us today, there is little doubt that they would be the marginalized; the homeless, the poor, the weird and untamed; the people that challenge our well maintained constructs.  How can we incorporate them in the Body when as an institution we struggle to accept those who are defined as ‘normal’, but who challenge its theological ‘norms’ – i.e.: women, singles, and the L.G.B.T. community?  How do we answer Christ’s call not to forget those who are in ‘prison’?  That is what mental illness is – a prison of the mind that in some situations has little hope of freedom. 

Christian scripture declares God to be the absolute solution to human suffering.  The question - how is that manifest?  Some promise that it comes through the supernatural, if only we believe.  Others say it’s a far off reality at the end of the age.  While sitting as a chaplain I was confronted by theologies that were a mixed bag of suspicion and contradiction; I listened to scriptures twisted into excuses or used as weapons binding individuals into an ‘I should’ prison.  I sat with people who wept because they were too sick to attend church; and others, to spite their suffering, who were grateful for each moment of life.  At the end of eleven weeks a few beliefs have begun to re-emerge; the first being the significance and inherent beauty of humanity; and the amazing reality that each individual person is created in God’s image (the imago Dei). 

No one person spoke louder to this reality than Mrs. L. and I fell in love with that woman during our numerous visits.  She is a beautiful, strong and powerful woman although her frail and failing state deceives the eye.  She shared her story of raising three children as a single Hispanic woman in the seventies; one of two women who owned her own business in the largely male dominated field of boxing; and who was transfused with tainted blood that brought on a lifetime of illness.  I sat with this woman in her piercing vulnerability as the nurse cleaned her; she serenaded me with a Mexican ballad; and even when she had little to no strength she gave me the gift of her unconditional love and acceptance by blowing me a kiss.  She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen and not because of an external aesthetic; but because life’s light shone bright from deep from within her soul.   The second conclusion - life is the most precious of gifts.  Watching an individual grasp for each breath can reveal two realities – one that we are biological beings who ‘need’ air, but there is a spiritual aspect to that as well.  Every breathe we take is a gift that should be honored and appreciated because we never know which one will be our last.

I have not drawn any conclusion to the problem of pain; nor have I reconciled my many theological struggles; but this one thing I know, unconditional love communicates the acceptance and mysterious message that God transcends human constructs.  It was in the midst of the comforting words my fellow chaplain brought to a woman who had just watched her premature baby die that I again arrived at the following conclusion; we are not called to ignore, minimize or theologize pain by giving answers where there are none.  Nor are we called to help others escape, deny or hide from the darkness that arrives at the most unexpected moments and in the most tragic of ways.  We are called to sit in the pain with those suffering and help them hold it; to be present and and to alleviate  some small portion of its weight. 

I recently heard a Kelly Clarkson song that resonated deeply of the truth that darkness is always present reality – a prophetic call asking if love can still be offered in the midst of it.  I believe that this is where both hope and healing lies. 

Oh oh oh, there's a place that I know
It's not pretty there and few have ever gone
If I show it to you now
Will it make you run away?

Or will you stay
Even if it hurts
Even if I try to push you out
Will you return?
And remind me who I really am
Please remind me who I really am

Everybody's got a dark side
Do you love me?
Can you love mine?
Nobody's a picture perfect
But we're worth it
You know that we're worth it
Will you love me?
Even with my dark side?

Like a diamond
From black dust
It's hard to know
What can become
If you give up
So don't give up on me
Please remind me who I really am

Everybody's got a dark side
Do you love me?
Can you love mine?
Nobody's a picture perfect
But we're worth it
You know that we're worth it
Will you love me?
Even with my dark side?

Don't run away
Don't run away
Just tell me that you will stay
Promise me you will stay
Don't run away
Don't run away
Just promise me you will stay
Promise me you will stay

Will you love me? ohh

Everybody's got a dark side
Do you love me?
Can you love mine?
Nobody's a picture perfect
But we're worth it
You know that we're worth it
Will you love me?
Even with my dark side?

Don't run away
Don't run away

Don't run away

Promise you'll stay