Journal of Sacred Work

Days 153-155 - Learning to Love

"I can give my teaching in brief. I can give my teaching in detail. It is those who understand that are hard to find." - The Buddha

   Moments after his birth, my grandson leans into his mother for the nurturing he must have to sustain life. He surrenders himself to her loving strength completely and unquestioningly.

   You can see in my daughter's face that she will give this tiny being every kind of Love a mother can offer. It will be the first Love he will know but not the last. This loving relationship between mother and child is one of the most inspiring examples of Love in this world. It will resonate for the rest of their lives. 

   Newborns "understand" something they will soon forget: Love comes to us when we yield to it, not when we try to conquer it.

   The pull of the world upon our body and spirit is so great that, as we edge into early childhood, body and spirit soon slip out of balance. Doubt arrives in our hearts and travels with us as a kind of life-long suffering. As our bodies and minds mature, we begin seeking with our human strength rather than yielding to God's Love.

How We Teach Love

   How do we teach what caregivers and their leaders say they already know? Why is it written in Proverbs 29:18 that "without a vision, the people perish?"

   The need for "a vision" is the need for hope. To live Love, we need to share a hopeful vision with each other. 

   Jesus offered us the most radical teaching in history in his Sermon on the Mount: "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." (Matthew 5:44) Don't we already "understand" these things?

   Unfortunately, we know, but we seem to forget. Instead of loving our enemies as fellow children of God, we are instead ruled by the old, unenlightened teaching of revenge: "an eye for an eye..."

   Babies know no hate, know no enemies and have only two fears: falling and sudden noises. Every other fear is learned.

   As babies, we looked outside ourselves for someone to bring to us what our bodies needed. No one taught us this. We moved, in our earliest days of life, by instinct. We discovered that we must have relationships.

   Beyond food, we saw early the energy that is the sole determinate of our life's meaning. We saw Love. We saw what Jesus sought to teach the woman at the well in Siloam - that it is not the actual water our spirits need. It is the endless richness of Love's "living water" that nourishes our thirsty souls.

   Without Love, our bodies can keep functioning. But without Love, what is the point of living? For Love breathes meaning into our lives. 

   Our years of living, our rising consciousness of the world, bring something else to us. We begin to unlearn Love. We learn to distrust and to fear - whether justified or not. 

   Children enter a society where transactions rule. We take in order to get. Or we trade - giving so as to receive.

   The way loving caregivers teach most powerfully is not "in brief or in detail." It is most of all by two things: example and presence. We learn by seeing, we learn by feeling Love's presence. And, when we are teaching, we are the ones who learn most.

How We Learn to Love

   It is difficult to teach what we have not yet learned. How do we learn to Love - to give with no expectation of getting something in return? As a housekeeper at Baptist Hospital taught me, "Love means helping other people no matter what."

   Jesus, Buddha, Moses, Mohamed, and every other prophet, make the teaching clear. As caregivers know better than most, love means loving God and loving others. It also means loving ourselves so that we may do both of these two things.  

   In his book, Love Walked Among Us: Learning to Love Like Jesus, Paul E. Miller writes that it is "our weakness, not our power...that enables us to know God."

   To leaders and caregivers across the country I offer Love's teachings. I offer them not because I am a great example, but simply as a messenger of ancient spiritual truth brought into caregivers environments.

   The suffering ask caregivers to live a Love that includes our skills, our discipline as well as our compassion. This is what those in need require from us in every setting where people come seeking healing.

   One hundred percent of leaders tell me they "understand" and believe in Love. Perhaps fifty percent make some effort to live this out. In my observation, less then ten percent achieve meaningful success at living what they say they understand and believe.

   Why? Part of the answer is that many truly do not "understand." Another part of the reason is that most top leaders are men. Most male CEOs, including me, have been taught to compete, to win, to conquer.

   It is against the nature of most men, as well as many women, to Love their enemies. An enemy is interpreted variously as, outside competitors, and anyone inside who threatens the power of the leader.

   For well-meaning leaders, an enemy can also be the difficulty in changing patterns that focus on profit at the expense of caring and efficiency at the expense of Love. In other words, most leaders practice an approach which is out of balance with Love.

   Teaching change is exceedingly difficult. For it requires that leaders and caregivers let go of some of the "power" they say they need.

   How do we "let go and let God?" How do we live our highest truth?

   The learning and the teaching of Love move in a circle. We learn, we forget, we relearn, we teach, we try out living Love, we succeed, we fail, we try again. The most important thing in this process is that we never give up striving to live God's Love.

   Love travels through us so long as we are seeking. The door in us through which Love flows will only fall shut if we quit.

   One of the most eloquent teachings I have ever encountered comes from poet T.S. Eliot in The Four Quartets: 

 I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
 for hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without
    love
 For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
 But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.

   How hard it is to let go of our power. How hard it is to know that it is "all in the waiting."

   I believe that we come to the point of waiting only after we strive. First we strive, then we wait for the Love that is most helpful in healing those who come to us in need.

   One day, as we wait, faith and love and hope will arrive. It is worth the waiting, for the moment of highest epiphany is called Grace.

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Note: The Journal of Sacred Work has now presented more than 1000 essays and garnered more than 4000 comments in its nearly four years of existence. Our 4th anniversary will be June 7. Thanks to each of you for your encounters with this work. 

On this Memorial Day, and every day, may we remember and pray for all of our brothers and sisters in the armed services and the many veterans who preceded them.

  

Day 151-152 Judi's Sanctuary

Rose in Judi's garden, photo's by Liz, unless otherwise identified.

Last week, a co-worker and dear friend, Ann Kaiser had a lovely array of roses on her desk. As I admired their beauty, Ann explained they were a gift of friendship. Rather serendipitously, Ann and Judi Vines had gifted each other that morning with fresh flowers from their respective gardens; two friends making an effort to bring joy into our world. Love manifests in small gestures of caring and encouragement. Ann began to tell me about Judi’s butterfly sanctuary. Judi has just earned the distinction of creating a certified wildlife habitat from the National Wildlife Federation. I was eager to visit and learn more about her garden. Judi welcomed this idea and we set a date for Saturday.

Judi & Larry Vines with their beloved dog Jager

The afternoon was perfect, sunny, blue skies, luminous clouds and a leisurely breeze. Judi and her husband Larry received Woody and I with warm hospitality. Larry’s masonry skills were evident throughout their home, patio, and garden with gorgeous stonework. Judi enthusiastically explained that several essential elements are necessary for designing a wildlife habitat. She pointed out the various floral designs, fruit trees, a fountain, bushes and contrasting greenery. These provide the necessary food, water, places to cover, places to raise young and sustainable gardening. For more information visit:

http://www.nwf.org/Get-Outside/Outdoor-Activities/Garden-for-Wildlife.aspx

   Cowtee bird taking a bath, photo by Judi and Larry Vines

There is something marvelously renewing about being outdoors. We feel our connection to Mother Earth, as songbirds serenade, butterflies dance and sun cradles our spirits. There is a feeling of peace, of being at home in a garden wherever it might be. True, Judi’s garden is a sanctuary for wildlife but it is also a sacred refuge for us humans!

Judi not only loves nature, she loves people and life. She is the essence of Mother Earth herself with a beautiful smile, upbeat personality, and her kind and generous ways. Judi has provided 21 years of dedicated service for St. Joseph Home Health and our community with a servant’s heart. As a Service Coordinator, she fulfills a crucial role in coordinating the scheduling of nursing care to meet patients’ needs. She is masterful in her work, as she maneuvers throughout the complexity of her day responding to multiple demands and bringing all together with seeming ease. Judi is in communication with patients, family members, and team members all day. Once Mr. R. called and reminisced about a time when he was in Paris and had a fabulous dinner. Judi decided to surprise him by making the same wonderful meal and delivering it to his home. This was especially meaningful because this man lives alone and is without any family. Judi has a way of transforming the ordinary into extraordinary moments. Judi often bakes and brings to work homemade apple pies, french bread, cinnamon muffins and other luscious desserts to nourish our spirits. She blesses so many with her Love and fills our hearts with gratitude.  
Photo of Hummingbird nesting, photo by Woody Wessel, click on to enlarge

In closing, I wish to share the above photo of a hummingbird that is nesting in an avocado tree in our back yard. We are delightfully anticipating the hatching of her chicks any day now. Thanks to Bonnie Callahan, I became aware of an amazing live web cam of Phoebe Allen, a Hummingbird who has nested in a rosebush in Irvine, CA. Her chicks, Hope and Hoku were born on May 9th and 10th and will be nesting for another week or so before taking flight. People from around the world are watching as this miracle unfolds. http://phoebeallens.com/big.html

 

“In Native American culture, a hummingbird symbolizes timeless joy and the Nectar of Life. It's a symbol for accomplishing that which seems impossible and will teach you how to find the miracle of joyful living from your own life circumstances.” (Ted Andrews).

Postscript: I am very sad to report that Hope and Hoku were startled from the nest on 5/28 by a crow.  Hoku was returned to the nest but Hope has yet to be found.

~Liz Sorensen Wessel

Days 149-150 - Fully Human

"We are all equal. But, some are more equal than others." - George Orwell, from Animal Farm   
 
   Only minutes old, my grandson looks out of his new eyes for the first time. He entered the world on May 24, 2010 in an afternoon filled with a light you see reflected in his eyes - or is that the light cast by the love of his mother and father?   

   What a gift he is in our lives. What luck for him - a healthy mother and father, a healthy older sister, four adoring grandparents. This healthy newborn now takes his place among humanity.

   Healthy? That's the natural question everyone asks: Is he healthy?

   We know he would be no less human if he were unhealthy. Or, if he had been born into poverty on the streets of Calcutta.

   We know that is true. But, the world behaves otherwise. It tells us "some are more equal than others."

   Society ranks and sorts us instantly. As Dr. Rollo May wrote, "One does not become fully human painlessly."

   How we are labeled determines whether we are treated as fully human. How we treat others determines whether we are listening to God's Love. 

   In the eyes of American society were slaves human? Not according to the United States Supreme Court which ruled in 1857 (in the infamous Dred Scott Decision) that slaves should be counted as "three-fifths of a person." Native Americans, those who occupied this country long before it was taken over by European Americans, fared even worse.

   Today, in the twenty-first century, are prisoners fully human? Some Wednesdays I head out to a Nashville area prison to minister to inmates. I travel through seven gates before I finally reach the area where 100 prisoners are sealed off from society. Each steel gate slams home a message: Anyone caged like this must not be as human as are we.

   Once a person is convicted, our society rapidly dehumanizes them. We don't see a person anymore. We see a criminal.

   When people see others this way, they have degraded another human being to becoming "less than" fully human. In so doing, they degrade themselves.

   Are patients fully human? Take off your clothes, put on a patient gown, and walk into a hospital. In most hospitals, you will instantly be seen, intentionally or not, as something less than fully human. You will become "the gall bladder" not the person, "the knee" not the person, "the diabetic," not the person.

   After all, you are "unhealthy" and you look completely helpless. You are weak and thus can fall victim to the strong. In the hierarchy of things, you sit (or lie) at the bottom. The folks at the top wear stethoscopes or business clothes. In the proverbial pecking order, doctor's scrubs win big over patient gowns.

   If this seems like a harsh judgment, go ahead and try it. See how you do getting the attention of an overworked nurse if you're wearing a patient gown. Count how long you wait on a gurney in a hallway waiting to be x-rayed.

   The human treatment of hospitalized patients got so bad that the government finally stepped in. A public website now publishes patient satisfaction statistics. Hospitals with consistently low scores may jeopardize their Medicare reimbursement status. At last, administrators began to take notice.

   The problem, of course, has not been first line caregivers. It has been leaders who looked down on caregivers as "the lower employees" (I've heard this phrase many times.) In addition, our healthcare system crowds out humanity in favor of efficiency. Can't we have both?

   Among the best-treated patients in hospitals are babies like my grandson (especially since circumcisions without anesthesia have fallen out of favor!) Newborns are not only helpless, but they look so cute. The elderly among us are not so lucky.

   We know the answer to this tragedy. Caregivers who live Love honor the full humanity of those who come to them sick or injured or both. In a Healing Hospital, loving leaders don't look down on first line staff, they look UP to them. For it is the first line caregivers who have the greatest impact, not the executives.

   The only way I know to solve the issue of patient discrimination is for us to accept that it is a real and serioius problem, to visualize a new culture flooded with loving care, and to live that culture of Love.

   The reason to do this is not because either the government or a supervisor is watching. It is because God is watching.

   God's Love offers the strength we need. When we open our hearts to this Love we see through a sacred lens.

   With this vision, we discover that a new light surrounds those people in the hallway wearing patient gowns. It is the light that illuminates full humanity and deep vulnerability - ours as well as theirs.

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Days 146-148 - Hope, The Power of Prayer & Marian

 
"He's not sick. It's worse. He's discouraged." - from the film, "It's A Wonderful Life"  (right, 1946) 

   The spot on her lung must be cancer, we all thought. Our Chief Nursing Officer had smoked for decades. We were all certain the end was near. Her doctor thought so too.

   She asked for our prayers. Dozens of us gathered in the chapel at Riverside Methodist Hospital in Columbus and poured out our deepest hopes to God - our wish that this great and compassionate life would be spared. But, most of us, including me, were pessimistic.

   Against the odds, the tumor was benign. The news gets better. All of this happened nearly twenty years ago and my dear friend, Marian Hamm, survives to this day. She is one of the best examples I know of the power of faith, hope & Love. 

   Marian's will is unsurpassed. Her spirit is divine.  

   Listen to her compassion: "There never has been a good day in a hospital," she wrote to me when she retired from Riverside Methodist Hospital in 1995. "Someone is always in pain. One person can't take a deep breath. Another can't move for fear of hurting."

   How well she describes the physical agonies that afflict each of us when the world casts us into illness or an accident tears away our sense of well being. Marian understands something deeper, as she said in the closing line of a poem she wrote to me:

   "...if we were to score/ all kinds of suffering/ on a scale of one to ten/ the loss of hope would win." 

   As a nurse and nurse leader all of her working life, Marian saw everything. Working together at Riverside Hospital in Toledo and then at Riverside Methodist Hospital in Columbus, Marian, along with our friend and fellow leader Tracy Wimberly, and I saw every kind of agony.

   The three of us knew what mattered most. When patients lose hope, they lose their lives.

   Why are purpose and meaning so important as energies of Love? Purpose and meaning fuel hope.

   A taproot is the center through which all the other roots are nourished. Hope is the taproot of Love. It is the energy that is most vital to the quality of our lives.

   With hope, we flourish. Without it, we wither.

   The finest caregivers in America understand the importance of hope in healing, as well as in curing. The least effective caregivers think medicine is only about fixing.

   Marian Hamm inspired the thousands of nurses she led by loving them. In so doing, she gave them, purpose, meaning and hope. Her leadership turned on her ability to balance being tender-hearted as well as tough-minded.

   At the end of a letter she sent to me in 1995 are words I will always treasure. "I liked having you walk into the middle of my life," she wrote, "strewing flowers, tossing balloons, turning on all the lights..."

   What a gift to receive such an eloquent tribute. For flowers, balloons, and lights are great symbols of hope. But, it was Marian who spread all these presents before me, Tracy and so many others. She "strews flowers" to this day for her large family and many friends.

   Marian is now seventy-six and stricken with emphysema. I find myself thinking once again that she must be in her last days. Then, I remember. She may be sick, but she is not discouraged.

   Marian understands the healing power of prayer. She knows God's Love. She will, to her dying breath, nurture the enormous energy we call hope. She is a beacon of Love for us all.

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Days 144-145 Everything Is a Miracle

        "If you could imagine the most incredible story ever, it would be less incredible than the story of our being alive on this earth." ~John O' Donohue         

  Watercolor by ~liz  5/3/10

Mandala is the Sanskrit word for sacred circle. Each of my drawings originate within a circle which symbolizes God; a beginning without end, inclusive, unconditional. The center represents the essence of God's Love, pure spiritual Light and union. A mandala is a microcosm of life and a macrocosm of the universe.  Polarities are characteristic as in nature with each element having an opposite, such as darkness and light, joy and sorrow, winter and summer, love and fear. Yet, ultimately there is no  separation because everything is interdependent and co-exists as One whole. 

The process of drawing a mandala invites a sense of integration and harmony. One begins to experience a greater awareness of how all our differing parts are necessary in creating the fullness of life. Many of the mandalas I’ve drawn are detailed designs that require focused attention. All are drawn with Loving intention.

In the mandala pictured above, I did not wish to control the process but rather open to trusting the process. I felt a peaceful calm come over me as the brush revealed a story on the page. Midway through, I encountered the shadowy territory of self-doubt. The colors were bleeding into one another in disarray. I thought about giving up and throwing the painting away when Sr. Madaleva’s voice popped into my head, “Don’t throw anything away, Liz. Art is like life. Sometimes things are chaotic and messy. Your paints might run together and turn brown like mud. Yet, if you hang in there what you thought was mucky might turn out to be beautiful in the end."  Curiously, I now notice this drawing is without polarity and defined borders. Increasingly, this is how I am coming to view life. God may be hidden from sight but Love's presence is always within us.

"There is a candle in your heart, ready to be kindled. There is a void in your soul, ready to be filled. You feel it, Don't you?" ~Rumi

I wish to share the following song with you by Peter Mayer called, "Holy Now." He sings a revelation, "Everything is a miracle, everything is Holy now."  Everything, even mud amid the changes of being alive.

What are you quick to discard from your life? What if you did not give up too quickly and did not toss it away?

~Liz Sorensen Wessel

Days 142-143 - Founding Story

"Love means helping other people no matter what." Tawana Jackon, housekeeper, Baptist Hospital.

   Organizations and important ideas always have what are called "Founding Stories." These tales exist as the true parables of meaning.

   The golden thread of Radical Loving Care was spun thousands of years ago. I coined the modern day application of God's Love as a way to adapt this energy for caregivers - to remind all caregivers that we hold the golden thread in our hands. Along with this came the development of Healing Hospitals and hospices.

   Like the parable of the Good Samaritan, founding stories are often about ordinary seeming, everyday events, not big, dramatic rescues. It is often in the unseen acts of kindness where we discover Love's expression most poignantly.

   Here is one of the key founding stories of Radical Loving Care. It was told to me more than a decade ago by a housekeeper on staff at Baptist Hospital when I was president there.

   "Last night," she told me at lunch in the hospital cafeteria, "I was mopping the floor outside a patient's room on the seventh floor. It was about 10 p.m. The patient was an old man. He was confused and kept crying out. He was calling for his daughter. I had seen his daughter leave way back at the end of visiting hours.

   "The man sounded so sad. I looked down the hallway and the nurses looked very busy. So, I put down my mop, walked into the patient's room, and took his hand in mine. I think maybe the old man thought I was his daughter. Anyway, as soon as I took his hand, he calmed down. Within a minute or two, he fell asleep. So I went back out in the hall and continued mopping.

   "Is this what you mean by loving care?" she asked me.

   Needless to say, it is. Why?

   The housekeeper heard someone in need and she brought her Love to meet that need. In so doing, she took a risk. Some supervisors would punish a person like her for stepping outside her "job description." In fact, this kind of punishment happens all the time. Far easier for the housekeeper, a veteran, to ignore the crying man and continue her work. After all, as an eight-year veteran, she had heard patients calling from their room many times.

   Note that the housekeeper gave Love with no expectation of thanks or any other response. Consider also that the housekeeper did not give any medication or other "treatment" except her kindness.

   The Love expressed by this housekeeper symbolizes what Radical Loving Care establishes as the norm in a Healing Hospital or hospice. Instead of a rare occurrence, loving expressions are common. Actions like the housekeepers, consistent with the parable of the Good Samaritan, are what happens when an ordinary culture becomes a loving culture.

   What are the stories you encounter that symbolize Radical Loving Care in your world? What is the difference, if any, between these stories and other encounters you see in the place where you work? 

-Erie Chapman

Days 139-141 - Love is Free but not Cheap

   We all want Love.

   Here's good news we sometimes forget. Love is free!

   Imagine. The most important energy in the world is completely without "cost." Let's all have some.

   Every hospital leader, every doctor, and every first line nurse (or other caregiver) always affirms, when asked, their sincere belief in Love. I have never had anyone tell me that there is anything more important. 

   So why don't we all live Love?  

   It is because Love is free but not cheap. And it is a rare person that is willing to pay the price. Every image of Christ's passion, or of anyone who has suffered to live Love, suggests a sacrifice most are unwilling to endure.

   What Love "costs" is revealed when staff members discover one big thing: living Love means replacing many old patterns of thought and action and enriching new ones. Whatever fear and indifference caregivers may be feeling needs to fall away in the presence of renewed Love.

   Pattern change is painful and "costly." That is why most caregivers and their leaders prefer the status quo. 

   Holy Cross, a wonderful hospital in Fort Lauderdale, Florida employs hundreds of committed caregivers. When I spoke there about Radical Loving Care, I could hear and see this wonderful dedication in both the voices and actions of the staff, board members, and physicians I encountered.

   I could also see doubt and worry in the eyes of some. Do I really have to deepen my practice of loving care? How will I do that? Will my boss truly support me?

   Sometimes, one of the biggest obstacles to progress is not caregiver unwillingness, but the reluctance of supervisors to support new and richer behaviors. The best practices of loving care can make current behavior look bad. That is why top leadership needs to demonstrate whole-hearted support as the hospital culture sails the rough-water voyage to a new level of excellence.   

   Years back, a hospital in Kentucky began the Radical Loving Care journey. Training was offered and everyone endorsed the initiative to deepen Love's commands: to give healthcare more competently, consistently and compassionately.

   A few months into the effort, the head of Human Resources called me. "Erie," she said, "we're going to have to suspend that Radical Loving Care program. We're going to be doing layoffs."

   "Why would you suspend loving care when it's needed most?" I asked.

   "Because people won't think it's very loving to cut their jobs," she answered.

   "Do you have a teenager?" I asked. She said that she did, a daughter.

   "If your daughter asked you if she could stay out all night, would you let her?" Naturally, she said no.

   "What if your teenager complained, 'If you Loved me, you'd let me do what I want?"

   "I know she'd be mad, but I would tell her only a mother who didn't care would let her stay out all night."

   "So it's hard to make a loving decision?"

   "This is about work, not teenagers," she told me.

   I asked her why they were doing layoffs. "We need to do this to be good stewards of our funds," she instructed me.

   "Is stewardship a part of Love?" I asked. She agreed that it was, but she remained uneasy.  

   I talked with her about ways to let people go that were respectful & loving as opposed to insensitive and inconsiderate. She was worried that the terminated employees would be angry at her.

   "The goal is excellence, not popularity," I said as gently as possible. "What's 'easy' is to hire security guards, send out layoff notices, and hide from employees so you don't have to face them. Is that the kind of leadership you want to have?  

   Love is free, but not cheap. The practice of Love requires discipline, training, and a "tough mind" as well as a "tender heart," to quote Martin Luther King, Jr. Love requires hard decisions and taking responsibility for the consequences.

   Love is not limited to kind touches and sweet words. As the character of Cole Porter says in the 2004 movie "De-Lovely,""Nothing comes easy, and when it does, it's lousy."    

   What does Love cost? The great theologian, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, wrote eloquently about what he called "cheap grace" - the expectation that grace will come without sacrifice and dedication. Grace, an expression of Love, never comes easily, he said. It requires the most difficult commitment of our lives.

   Bonhoeffer was a man of his word. He was executed by the Nazis during World War II because he refused to turn his back on God. 

   Most worldly energy pulls us away from God's Love. That is why it is so difficult, and so "expensive" to live Love. That is why so few are willing to pay the "price" Love asks. Yet, the greatest energy that flows through the world comes when we sacrifice to help others - when we live Love, not fear.

-Rev. Erie Chapman, J.D.

*Image of Christ on the Cross - artist unknown

Days 137-138 The Divine Gift of Remembrance

"To the soul memory is more important than planning, art more compelling than reason, and love more fulfilling than understanding." ~Thomas Moore    

                      

             In Loving Remembrance of Patrick Gustave Gleason   Mandala Watercolor by ~liz

This week, I attended a Celebration of Life for Pat Gleason, the father of my friend and colleague, Pam Paul. The priest gave an especially meaningful eulogy. He spoke of the choice we have to love. We can choose, as Pat did, to reach out to others in need and live a life of loving service. I listened as Pam shared these sweet remembrances of her dad:   

                                                My Dad 

My Dad gave airplane rides to all the kids on the block 

My Dad piled his entire Little League team into his Triumph Spitfire 

My Dad never cooked when he was married to my Mom, but when he decided to cook, he made Crab Benedict for Easter Brunch, and it was good! 

My Dad made Pasties, an Irish Meat Pie for Sunday family dinners 

My Dad loved the Yankees! 

My Dad loved Minnesota, state of his birth. 

My Dad loved to argue and he was always right. (Even when he was wrong he would wear you down until he was right) 

My Dad was devoted to Alcoholics Anonymous and credited the organization with saving his life. 

My Dad was fierce, loyal and opinionated. 

My Dad was exceptionally smart.

My Dad loved by many.

My Dad was loved by me.

~Pam Paul

Father Christian then spoke of the divine gift of remembrance by quoting Mathew 18:20, "For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them."  When we remember our loved ones, they too are in our midst. That is the power of Love! What a beautiful realization, this gift of remembrance.

~Liz Sorensen Wessel

Days 135-136 Seven Sentences

   Most of us want to distill extensive and complex thinking down to a few simple ideas we can remember. Otherwise, how can we translate esoteric notions into ideas we can live? Although this will always be a practice in over-simplification, key thoughts, summarized in a few sentences, can be a starting point from which we can develop our thinking and our life behaviors. Meaningful ideas are never simple.

   After all, we cannot describe the essence of beauty. Portraying a rose through painting, photograph, music or poem can never reach the deepest meaning of her beauty. But, we can choose to be present to her rather than simply glancing and then rushing on to the next thing. We can experience Love and do our best to share it.

   Below are some of the sentences that guide the practice of Radical Loving Care. I don't offer them as some kind of list to memorize but only as a way to capsilize of foundational beliefs and practices for caregivers. 

1) "God is Love."

   The above sentence from 1 John is the center of Radical Loving Care. There is no more important sentence than this. God is not like Love, God is Love. Since God is Light & God is Beauty.

2) Live Love, not fear.

   Part of the importance of this sentence is that it may highlight for us how much of our lives we currently live in fear: fear of losing our jobs, fear of losing money, fear of losing a certain relationship, fear of illness and injury. The only way to deal with fear is to replace it with Love.

3) Where attention goes, energy flows.

   This sentence is so useful in living Radical Loving Care. Do your thoughts tend to fall into negative patterns? If so, this sentence can be a powerful reminder of our ability to shift our attention along more powerful pathways. Some people try to do this by telling themselves NOT to think certain things. This approach doesn't work because in order to stop thinking of something, you have to think of it.

4) Take care of the people who take care of people.

   This is the single most important job any leader has in a caregiver setting. If leaders take care of, and love, their fellow staff members, Love can flourish.

5) "He (or she) who has a why, can bear almost any how."

   This sentence, first framed by the philosopher Nietzsche, was adopted by Dr. Victor Frankl and converted into one of the most powerful philosophies in the world. When we have found our life purpose and followed it, all things are possible. When we haven't, nothing important can be accomplished.

6) Have fun and live with passion. Take your work seriously, not yourself. If we are interested in living with humility, a sense of humor is essential. Live passionately. No one has ever accomplished anything important by living safely.

7) Whatever the question, Love is the answer.

   I invite you to reflect on these seven sentences, to convert them into language that fits your own life, and to engage these thoughts as positive energy. They will inform your practice of living Love, not fear.

   Here is one last question:  What is the most loving thing you have done today? This question is a great way to raise your consciousness and focus your energy.

   Whenever we live Love, we always benefit others...and ourselves.

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Photo of rose by Dane Dakota

Days 132-134 - "Rebirth?"

    My heart, like yours, has been broken many times. My spirit has often suffered as well. I have also broken the hearts of others, including cutting the jobs of dedicated caregivers. In many ways, my heart and, I hope, yours, has also healed in important ways. Darkness is required before there can be any kind of "rebirth."

   Each day, the question for loving caregivers is always the same: What can I do to help another? Hidden somewhere within you is another question: Do I have the insight and strength to choose an even richer way to encounter my relationships - both with people and the world?

   Can you be "reborn?"

   As a caregiver, what lies ahead as you wind through sun and dark shadows? What of Love will you bring to the encounters that will come to you this very day, and in your days ahead?  

   It is the dreams we choose to follow, rather than the ones we are dragged into, that bring the most joyful fulfillment to our lives. Oddly, we often decline the invitation life offers to each of us, at any age.

   We always have the chance to begin anew, or to renew our journey. If your journey is to be meaningful, it will require traveling through a different experience than anything you have lived thus far.

   All of the "insights" I suggest are offered not because I know better than anyone else. Instead, what appears here is an effort to summarize and redesign the best wisdom of the ages in ways that caregivers can use.

   Although, I like to think I am a wiser person than I was twenty or thirty years ago. I'm not sure this is true - in spite of my efforts. Wisdom tells us this: We all need keep asking the same questions and look for new answers. Instead, most people become tired of the questions and fail to seek better answers.

   What has your adulthood been up to this point? To conduct this inner inquiry, several inquiries are of deep importance. Reluctant as I am to list and number things, I know this is often helpful to many.  

1. How do you deal with the four different relationship we describe in living Love as a caregiver: a) your relationships to yourself (& God), b) how you encounter patients. Do you accept that you will one day be sick yourself? c) how you connect with your team members? d) how you relate to leadership.
2. How much fear remains in your life and how well are you able to replace fear with Love?
3. Have you considered the pathway you would like to take in whatever time you have left on this earth?

   Anyone who wants live Love in the deepest way needs to "die" to their old way of living. Many of your current habits may have held you back. 

   Changing the thoughts that lead to these behaviors may involve a dark and difficult pathway. After all, "dying" means letting go of many things we have loved about our current life. 

   Living Love at the highest level is a process that will result in your "rebirth." Can you come face-to-face with your most negative biases? Can you maintain your commitment in the face of obstacles that are sure to come?

   Rebirth is rarely a sudden process (although it may begin with a dramatic epiphany.) When Saul, on the road to Damascus, heard the voice of Jesus and became Paul, he needed to act on this experience in his life. Fortunately, he did.

   On the other hand, Siddhartha's transformation, or "rebirth," into the Buddha came through a long and painful process. It began when he renounced the great wealth and luxury of his early life to pursue the path to enlightenment.

   What if Paul had never gone about his preaching? If he had dismissed his experience, approximately half the pages of the New Testament, all written or attributed to Paul, would never have appeared!

   What if Siddhartha had refused to pursue his pathway to enligtenment? Buddhism, today the fourth largest faith in the world, would never have been founded

   Ministers often tell me stories about people who come to them reporting they have been "saved" only to come back a week later to say they are lost again, then returning a month later to say they have been "saved" once more. So many give up. Persistence in Love's journey is among the most critical energies to sultan.

   We know that the same is true in our lives. Talk show host Larry King told me during an interview on my old television show, "Life Choices with Erie Chapman" that after his first heart attack, he "saw the light" and promised he would never smoke again. His promise only lasted a few weeks and soon he was back to his old habits. Awhile later, he was hit with another heart attack, this time much more severe. This time, he got serious about changing his life and was "reborn" into a new way of living.

   Dr. Bernie Segal, M.D., told me in another interview on that same show that absent a traumatic event, people don't change. He's partly right. Traumatic events hold the great potential to alter our life course. Absent these events, our person change process moves by steps - typically backward as well as forward.

   Hardest of all, we need to renew our choice of Love everyday. Life any living thing, Love must be nurtured because where attention goes, energy flows.

   I believe we all know these things. My questions are offered as a challenge to you as a caregiver. The challenge is much easier to ignore than to accept.  

   If you (and I) truly wish to live the Love in which you believe - in your everyday life as well as in your life as caregivers - you know you need to honestly and persistently engage practices of the kind I have described in this work on Love. Absent a deep commitment, absent a new way of thinking and altered life practices, you will drift along to the end of your days having missed life's greatest opportunity.

   With Love, all things are possible. If you believe this, begin anew. The journey will last the rest of your life. If you are already on this journey, you have found life's finest wisdom. You know your opportunities for deeper growth.

   If you have not begun your path toward living Radical Loving Care, why not begin? If not now, when?

-Erie Chapman

Days 130-131 This is dedicated to all who birth Love in our world.

 
Mom's Mandala by ~liz
Happy Mother’s Day!

A mother's love determines how
We love ourselves and others. 
There is no sky we'll ever see
Not lit by that first love.

Stripped of love, the universe
Would drive us mad with pain;
But we are born into a world
That greets our cries with joy.

How much I owe you for the kiss
That told me who I was!
The greatest gift--a love of life--
Lay laughing in your eyes.

Because of you my world still has
The soft grace of your smile;
And every wind of fortune bears
The scent of your caress.

~Nicholas Gordon

National Nurses Week begins each year on May 6th and ends on May 12th, Florence Nightingale's birthday. The important role nurses play in the delivery of health care cannot be overestimated. Patients and families and healthcare ministries rely on nurses expertise, experience and caring nature every day. Nurses Week provides a wonderful opportunity to celebrate the spirit of nursing and acknowledge nurses tireless efforts as vital healthcare professionals.

“We assume that Love comes as a bright light, a magnificent burst of energy before our eyes. But the older I get, the more I believe that Love comes like the single candle on a night without electricity.” ~Michael Sullivan

Nightingales eternal lamp continues to burn brightly as it is passed on from one generation to the next. Florence Nightingale was a great pioneer in the field of nursing. Nightingale believed that every person who is drawn to ease the pain and suffering of another is an instrument of genuine healing. What inspires and motivates us is her dream of healing our world and this fuels the lamp of daily perseverance of working for a greater good.

 

Happy Nurse’s Week!

                                    Place Your Healing Touch in My Hands

Help me as I care
for my patients today,
Be there with me,
O Lord, I pray
Make my words kind
 --it means so much--
And in my hands place
Your healing touch
Let your love shine
through all that I do,
So those in need
may hear and feel You.

~Anon

 

 

Days 128-129 - Your Personal Journey

"I was born modest. But, it didn't last." - Mark Twain

   As Twain's brilliant line suggests, the relative innocence of our infancy cannot last.

   Born into an earth flooded with challenges, we are, as babies, still close to God. Yet, immediately, the earth exerts her pull on us. Our bodies call for food & shelter - and must have it to survive in this world

   As a caregiver, you have already shared the crises of those for whom you cared and helped them through hard chapters in their lives. What about you? What about your personal life crises? How have these affected your life and your caregiving?

   The discussion of Love's principles and energies is meaningless unless you can find your way to a key life choice: Whether to commit (or not) to live Love, or to let your life drift along randomly. 

   History carries the stories of the famous and the unknown who have traveled a journey that can teach each of us:

   Jesus' life may be well known, but we may never have thought of it in stages - his birth; his childhood teachings; the transcendence of his adulthood. What do these stages tell us about grace and Love? 

   Before Jesus, other life stories were recounted in ways that can help us. Homer describes the classic hero's stages through The Odyssey - the enduring myth of Ulysses (or Odysseus). Dante's Inferno describes a journey through the stages of hell and the guidance provided by the Virgil. Milton tells a parallel story in Paradise Lost.  

   Rather than think of these stories as remote from us, think of how useful these allegories can be as you evaluate your own life journey. What do you know about your spiritual energy? How do you encounter the world at this stage of your life?

   Consider the life pathway (obviously, just a sketch) you have already traveled:  

• YOUR INFANCY: Were you lucky enough to receive Love from your mother (or someone else) right after your birth? Physicians know what happens when babies do not receive loving care. Elizabeth Krueger, M.D., a neonatologist at Nashville's Baptist Hospital, says, "Babies who are not held and loved often die." Whereas, if your infancy was celebrated, you gained a greatly increased chance to live God's Love in this world in ways that can ease the pain of others.

• YOUR CHILDHOOD & ADOLESCENCE: From your childhood through your adolescence, most of
  your life was still at the mercy of adults. Did you feel loved during this period? We all know that children who are raised with the mean hand of abuse and hatred, or the ignoring back of indifference, are likely to grow into adults who repeat this behavior. As a former prosecuting attorney and judge, and more recently in my ministry to prisoners, I have seen so many cases of criminals who were abused as children. At the same time, many survive this abuse and sometimes find Love in spite of their hard childhood. Others were lucky enough to experience Love as young people and feel Love growing within them through this transitional stage. 

• YOUR ADULTHOOD: As you became more respobsible for your life choices, which paths did you take? We can allow the pull of the world to drag us down or lift us up or, more typically, some of both. We all know people we refer to as "blessed" from birth and those who seem "cursed." Most of us lie somewhere in between. What about YOU? Unless you have given up on your life, you have a powerful set of choices awaiting you in this world, choices which can enrich your life - or poison it.  

    The three stages outlined above offer the most rudimentary kind of sketch. They do not, in any way, describe the searing nature of some of your life events. They don't touch upon your joy, your boredom, your everyday encounters with the world

    The purpose of reflecting on your life journey is not only to consider what it has been, but what your life might yet hold and how you will chose to encounter your world. Everyone who chooses Love is certain to be blessed - especially if they are able to do so during the hardest times. All of us have a great opportunity to grow by engaging Love's energy.

   Love is not a one time choice. It is a daily and hourly and moment-by-moment decision.

   Love's energy is always present and available to us. What needs nurturing is our human ability to choose Love in our encounters.

   As you consider your life, as you reflect on the enormous range of Love's energies available to you in this world, you will discover powerful life choices that others have overlooked or cast aside in their own lives. Among these choices include three broad life attitudes:

   1) Cynicism: Turning your back on Love, perhaps because you, personally, have been hurt, or because you see no "use" in Love.

   2) The Ordinary Path: Engaging in Loving encounters randomly but mostly living your life in the apparent comfort of the status quo. This is, of course, the most common choice;

   3) Love: This is the rarest choice - and the most gratifying. Those who live Love choose this way of life through a new or renewed commitment. They realize that a commitment means nurturing all of Love's energies every day.

   Choosing Love is wise but difficult. It requires letting go of some of our old patterns of thinking and acting. But, choosing Love is not drudgery. It is the pathway to joy - a joy that will illuminate both your life and the lives of all you encounter.

   Are you ready to choose Love in a new and even more powerful way? Are you ready to sustain and enrich your commitment to celebrate the one life you have been given?

-Rev. Erie Chapman

125-127 - Life Changing Stories - Out from the Cave

   The culture of hospitals and hospices is apparent by the stories that are told. Show me an organization whose stories focus only on finance and competition and I will show you a charity that is not living its mission. Loving organizations tell stories that portray the most powerful energy there is: Love.

   My favorite parable is, of course, The Good Samaritan. This story had endured across twenty centuries and will continue to change lives far into the future.

   Go back another five centuries before the birth of Jesus and you will find another great parable. It is called the Allegory of the Cave and its telling and retelling are ascribed to both Socrates and Plato.

   I first heard the myth in college more than forty years ago. Of all the lectures I heard during four years at Northwestern University, this story has stayed with me the most vividly. Ancient allegories can teach powerful truths to the caregivers of today.

   Here is my summary of the story (very much abridged.) Imagine a person who, along with others, lives his entire life at the bottom of a cave. Everyone is chained to a large rock in such a way that they can only see, before them, shadows projected on the wall via the light cast by a fire burning behind them. Because of their chains, they can look neither right nor left.

   Pause for a moment to consider this fanciful image. Because all the people at the bottom of the cave can only see shadows, that is their entire concept of reality in the world. They are like natives in the Philippines who have never left the jungle (or we, who have never seen their world.) They are like some of the people caregivers treat who may have little or no knowledge of the human body they occupy.

   Now, imagine that you are one of the prisoners and you are released. You discover fire. You discover the three dimensional world. You are amazed and want to go back and tell your friends.

   Instead, a guide takes you on a journey out of the cave. You see trees, birds, hills, clouds. You see the sun.

   Now, you are even more excited to carry your discovery to your friends. You return to the bottom of the cave, resume your position beside your lifelong colleagues, and tell them what you have seen, heard, smelled, touched, tasted.

   How do they react? In the allegory, instead of being enchanted, the people in the cave presume that the man who is returned is completely crazy. Instead of celebrating him, they want to kill him.

   In real life, this is what happened to Socrates. He told the truth in such powerful ways that he was compelled to take a lethal poison.

   What happens when we develop an exquisite sense of Love? We experience an epiphany. We see the world in entirely new ways.

   In other words, we enter a different, higher consciousness. In this consciousness, a state often entered by artists and saints as well as caregivers, we see the world from a new vantage point. Those who have not attained this consciousness cannot be expected to understand us unless they are unusually empathetic.

   Our role is to seek to communicate a pathway to this consciousness through the example we set. Further, we need to find the eloquence that will help us tell the story of what Love means and how critical it is in our world. This is what Jesus offered. This is what all the saints and the great tell us with their lives. And this is what everyday saints say with the way they give care.

   This altered state, this epiphany, sometimes occurs when longtime caregivers suddenly experience a hospitalization of their own. Suddenly, perhaps for the first time, they come up out of the cave of ignorance and discover how it really feels to be a patient - the profound helplessness, the pain, the humiliation, the need for healing.

   Now, they want to tell everyone. Unless they are unusually eloquent, they will find themselves ignored, perhaps even ridiculed.

   What happened to Jesus when he described his message of Love for all? Yes, he found followers. More often, he encountered skepticism, ridicule and, finally, crucifixion.

   As I go about the country telling telling stories and describing the concept of Radical Loving Care - a concept which is derived entirely from my sense of the Christian tradition - I find followers of this gospel of Love. Much more often, I encounter doubt, skepticism & cynicism. Sometimes, CEO's ridicule my use of the word Love. Most CEOs, particular the males, are stubbornly unwilling to engage the change necessary to become a Healing Hospital through Radical Loving Care.

   Of course, no one threatens to kill me. Instead, they kill the idea I am advancing.

   So, what is the use of the allegory? It is to encourage those who believe in Love to know that they have found the truth. It is also to affirm those who practice Radical Loving Care that they can take great comfort in this knowledge: they are engaging the most powerful energy there is.

   For what is more important than Love?

-Erie Chapman

  

Days 123-124 Bringing Us Closer

  "So when words bring you closer to the prisoner in his cell, to the patient who is dying on his bed alone, to the starving child, then it's a prayer.” -Elie Wiesel

April 11, 2010 was "Yom HaShoah," Holocaust Remembrance Day. I was fortunate to hear an interview with guest Elie Wiesel on Krista Tippett’s, Speaking of Faith. Mr. Wiesel is a recipient of the Congressional Gold Medal and the Nobel Peace Prize. He is well known for his efforts to end the bloodshed and persecution of Jews as well as other people suffering atrocities in countries around the world. Both Elie Wiesel’s parents and his little sister died during the Holocaust. He miraculously survived the horrors of the concentration camps. In his interview, Mr. Wiesel shared profound insights about how the Holocaust changed him forever and the impact it had on his faith.

 When asked about his declared lack of faith and if he ever reconsidered, Wiesel said, “ I couldn't make it ten minutes later. At that moment, I made it. And because it was there, I had to make it. But as I said earlier, then I went back to prayer. Again, remember that — what is prayer? You take words, everyday words, and all of a sudden they became holy. Why? Because there is something that separates one word from another and then you try to fill the vacuum. With what? With whom? With what memory? With what aspiration? So when words bring you closer to the prisoner in his cell, to the patient who is dying on his bed alone, to the starving child, then it's a prayer.” Weisel’s poignant response led me to reflect on the meaning of prayer.

  Prayer is hopeful. Prayer contains our greatest desires. At a basic level, we turn to prayer in challenging times to ask for help for those we love. We hope for safety at the onset of a journey. We hope for good health. We hope for wisdom when making a conflicting decision. We hope for an end to war, abuse and poverty. We hope for happiness and a good life.

 Prayer is humbling. Prayer is recognition that we are not the authors of our lives. We can not control or manipulate life to conform to our demands, as much as we try. Prayer is letting go in faith and trust. Prayer is being willing to acknowledge our weakness. Prayer is a fervent desire to be loved and the mistaken belief that we are not worthy of love. Yet, it matters not if we are worthy or unworthy for God’s love for us is unconditional.

 Prayer brings us closer (Wiesel.) When we have the courage to stand present and bear witness to another person’s suffering that is prayer. It is a privilege to be invited into the inner sanctuary of a person’s life. When entering into the darkness of despair we risk touching the vulnerability of our own pain as well.  When doing so, a mutuality of compassion overflows illuminating our way.Today if you hear God's voice, harden not your heart. Psalmist (Ps 95)

   Prayer is stillness. A contemplative approach to prayer is different from requesting that God intervene in our lives. It is more of a sincere desire to enter into the presence of the Divine. It is prayer that longs for communion with God. There in the stillness of our soul we wait for God to speak. God’s brilliance is beyond thought, beyond word, and immerses us in compassion for ourselves and for others. "Prayer is not asking. Prayer is putting oneself in the hands of God, at his disposition,and listening to his voice in the depths of our hearts." ~Mother Teresa

 Prayer is living the fullness of life. We wait for God not only in stillness of our hearts but in our daily living, in our work and playfulness. The very act of breathing is a gift of unconditional Love from our creator. Every breath is a communion with God. Every step we take is an opportunity to walk in peace (Thich Nhat Hahn.) Living in awareness opens us to receive moments of Grace that might otherwise go unnoticed or remain hidden from our sight.

 Prayer is action. In it’s most powerful form prayer is service to humankind. There is so much unmet need in our world. Too often, our fear based thinking restricts us in a mindset of self-protection. Yet, prayer transforms our restrictive stance of “no” not me into the possibilities of “yes” we can. Love enables us to move beyond self-interest to reach out to others. It is here that we find God and when we are serving another, we discover the Holiest of all Communion.

  Prayer is universal. Ghandhi once said, “I believe in the fundamental truth of all great religions of the world. I believe that they are all God-given and I believe that they were necessary for the people to whom these religions were revealed. And I believe that if only we could all of us read the scriptures of the different faiths from the standpoints of the followers of these faiths, we should find that they were at bottom all one and were all helpful to one another.”

Prayer is Unity. I share the following prayers with you in celebration of our Oneness.

Peace be with you.

~Liz Sorensen Wessel

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I believe in the sun
though it is late in rising.
I believe in love
though it is absent.
I believe in God
though He is silent.

 Anonymous Holocaust Survivor Cologne Germany

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And we know that all things work together
for good to them that love God,
to them who are called according to his purpose.

Romans 8:28 - The Apostle Paul

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  Buddhist Prayer

Thou art everywhere, but I worship you here:
Thou art without form, but I worship you in these forms:
Thou needest no praise, yet I offer you these prayers and salutations.

 ~Anon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hindu Prayer

When you pray you are speaking to God,
meditate, still your mind,
and then you can hear God.
Only when your mind becomes still
can you get clarity.

Shri Shivabalayogi Maharaj

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Baha'i Prayer - Bahá'u'lláh

 
O Source of my being,
and by the breezes of Thine eternity gladden me,
O Thou Who art my God!
Let Thine everlasting melodies breathe tranquility on me,
O my Companion,
and let the riches of Thine ancient countenance
deliver me from all except Thee, O my Master,
and let the tidings of the revelation of Thine
incorruptible Essence bring me joy,
O Thou Who art the most manifest of the manifest
and the most hidden of the hidden

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  Islamic Prayer -

Send Thy peace O Lord, which is
perfect and everlasting,
that our souls may radiate peace.
Send Thy peace O Lord, that we
may think, act and speak harmoniously.
Send Thy peace O Lord, that we
may be contented and thankful for
Thy bountiful gifts.
Send Thy peace O Lord, that our lives
may become a Divine vision and in Thy light,
all darkness may vanish.
Send Thy peace O Lord, our Father and Mother,
that we Thy children on Earth may all
unite in one family.

 Pir-O-Murshid Inayat Khan - 1921 ±

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jain Prayer

May the sacred stream of amity flow
forever in my heart,
may the universe prosper
such is my cherished desire.
May my heart sing with ecstasy
at the sight of the virtuous,
and may my life be an offering
at their feet.
May my heart bleed at the sight
of the wretched, the cruel, the poor and the irreligious,
and may my tears of compassion
flow from my eyes.
May the spirit of goodwill
enter all our hearts,
may we all sing together in chorus
the immortal song of human concord.

The Immortal Songs - Gurudev Shri Chitrabhanuji - 1950's 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sikh Prayer

I see no stranger, I see no enemy
Wherever I look, God is all I see
I don't think of us and them
No one do I hate or condemn
I see God's image – each one a friend.
Of any religion, caste or race
All I see is God's shining face
His smiling face, His gracious face.
Accept as beautiful all His design
I learnt this truth in sangat divine
One Word resounds in me and you
Waheguru ... Waheguru ...
In him, in her, in me and you
Waheguru ... Waheguru ...
Beholding in every being His light
I bloom like a flower in joy and delight.

Adi Granth - Guru Arjun Dev Ji - Ca. 1604 CE.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tao Prayer

Empty of all doctrines,
The Tao is wisdom eternally inexhaustible.
Fathomless for the mere intellect,
The Tao is the law wherewith all things come into being.
It blunts the edges of the intellect,
Untangles the knots of the mind,
Softens the glare of thinking,
And settles the dust of thought.
Transparent yet invisible,
The Tao exists like deep pellucid water.
Its origin is unknown,
For it existed before Heaven and Earth

The Book of Balance - Chapter 4 - Lao Tsu - Circa 600 BCE

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Zoroastrian Prayer: God Is Love

With bended knees, with hands outstretched, do I yearn for the effective 
expression of the holy spirit working within me:
For this love and understanding, truth and justice; for wisdom to know the 
apparent from the real that I might alleviate the sufferings of men on earth.... 
God is love, understanding, wisdom, and virtue. Let us love one another, 
let us practice mercy and forgiveness, let us have peace, born of fellow-feeling...
Let my joy be of altruistic living, of doing good to others. Happiness is unto 
him from who happiness proceeds to any other human being. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Native American Prayer  

O Great Spirit of our Ancestors, I raise my pipe to you. 
To your messengers the four winds, and to Mother Earth who provides for your children: 
Give us the wisdom to teach our children to love, to respect and to be kind to each other so that they may grow with peace in mind. 
Let us learn to share all the good things that you provide for us on this Earth.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shinto Prayer

Although the people living across the ocean surrounding us, I believe, are all our brothers and sisters-why are there constant troubles in this world? Why do winds and waves rise in the ocean surrounding us?
I only earnestly wish that the wind will soon puff away all the clouds which are hanging over the tops of the mountains.