Journal of Sacred Work

Days 329-333 - Hospital-Acquired Suffering

 "Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast." - Alice in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll   

   As a physician he treated patients for more than fifty years. Now eighty years old he increasingly finds himself on the other side of the caregiving model. 

   "It's one nightmare after another. Recently, I had an agonizing sore throat after a procedure & tried to convince staff that something had been left in." Afraid to bother an attending physician at night they refused to check themselves. "I finally reached into my throat, found two extra nasogastric tubes caught there, and pulled them out myself."

   Even though they know the system doctors often experience as much suffering as do the rest of us. Few  take active steps to solve the problem. 

   There is already enough suffering in the hospital experience. Why does the system add more?

   Part of the answer is the abject failure of both lay & physician leaders to appreciate that the definition of suffering must be expanded.

   Ask any patient who has experienced the extended pain of a full bladder. They will tell your their pain was often worse than anything to do with their disease. The issue is often short-staffing.  Nurses suffer as well.

   Meanwhile, executives remote from direct caregiving earn fat salaries. Maybe those paychecks would be justified if those same leaders were dedicated to solving hospital-acquired suffering. 

   Among the worst indignities is "healthcare" that inflicts unnecessary treatments & "Code Blues" on patients who are not only terminal but have left DNR instructions. 

   The refusal to prioritize some of these issues as real medical problems instead of minor inconveniences is a problem whose answer lies at the feet of leadership. Their failure to address it demonstrates a cynical disregard for the mission of loving care.  

-Erie Chapman

Sacred Encounter painting by Liz Wessel

Days 328-329 Giver of Light

“All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.” -Julian of Norwich

In this we surrender and trust.

During Thanksgiving weekend we have the opportunity to pause amid the weaving's of our days to really notice, offer a generous presence and open to the fullness of experience.  

The frenetic energy of incessant thinking can distract us from what is here. It helps to pay attention to our patterned thoughts and our filters that alter our seeing. The stories we tell ourselves, in response to situations, are more a reflection of our internal world. If we let all the drama fall away we are left sitting with our emotions. Unpleasant emotions are the ones we prefer to deny or discard. A better choice is to acknowledge rather than reject, be curious rather than fearful, open up space for and meet with kindness.  If we are patient with our listening and in keeping company with, we come to understand the deepest truth of our being; yours and mine. All that remains is Love, an ocean of Love.

Personally, there are times when my clouded thinking can whirl up a storm. Yet, a simple pause to STOP, return to the present and ask, “What about right now in this moment?” As I gaze around, I begin notice; the cozy warmth and glow of fireplace embers,  peace in this quiet morning, birds cawing greetings while passing overhead, grandfather clock chiming the hour with no appointments to keep, sun streaming shimmering patterns on the wall, and a knowing that all is well.

Yesterday many of us gathered together in celebration of countless blessings. We remember and we send love to many who could not be together. Living in awareness of the precious, yet fleeting nature of life, we give up any complacency of taking for granted. Instead, we recognize the pleasure we receive in the little gifts of service we offer one another, wholeheartedly.

 

The Pleasure of Serving
by Gabriela Mistral

All of nature is a yearning for service:
The cloud serves, and the wind, and the furrow.

Where there is a tree to plant, you be the one.
Where there is a mistake to undo, let it be you.

You be the one to remove the rock from the field,
The hate from human hearts,
And the difficulties from the problem.

There is joy in being wise and just,
But above all there is the beautiful,
The immense happiness of serving.

How sad the world would be if all was already done.
If there was no rosebush to plant,
No enterprise to undertake.

Do not limit yourself to easy tasks.
It's so beautiful to do what others dodge.

But don't fall prey to the error that only
Great tasks done can be counted as accomplishments.
There are small acts of service that are good ones:
Decoratively setting a table,
Putting some books in order,
Combing a little girl's hair.
That one over there is the one that criticizes,
This other one is the one that destroys.
You be the one that serves.

Serving is not a labor just for inferior beings.
God, who gives fruit and light, serves.
His name could be rendered thus: He Who Serves.

And he has his eyes on our hands,
And he asks us at the close of day:
"Did you render service today? To whom?
To a tree, to your friend, to your mother?"

Chilean poet Gabriela Mistral won the 1945 Nobel Prize for Literature.

 

From my heart to yours  with gratitude,

Liz Sorensen Wessel

Mandala by ~liz

Days 322-326 - The Table

"We gather together to ask the Lord's blessing..."

   Just to be invited to sit at such an elegant Thanksgiving table is a blessing. To imagine those who will occupy each chair is to experience the gratitude that comes from the presence of family.

   This table from my grandparents has hosted  Thanksgivings since 1911. This year seventeen will gather around it. You can tell by the high chair at the far corner that one of these is still a baby. We assume she cannot yet understand Thanksgiving. But, maybe she can. 

   Little Caroline, barely a year into this world, will surely experience what is most important about this occasion: The warmth of love's presence.

   The air will send her the taste of pleasant scents. The same air will host laughter & prayers & the sound of caring voices.

   She will receive the touch of those eager to caress her baby's skin. She will hear the songs of Thanksgiving. Beyond words, she will experience the rhythms of a language she cannot yet speak.  

   Caroline will also see who is smiling & who is not. Who is angry & who is sad & who wears the secret mask of worry.

   She has more than five senses, of course. Her soul carries the knowing that matters - the awareness that she is loved. 

   Caroline does not need "to ask the Lord's blessing." In an important way, neither do we. We can look into her eyes & into the eyes of everyone who gathers around the table of Thanksgiving.

   Consult the blood that nourishes you, listen to the messages enriching your every fiber & feel the skin that wraps you for life's journey.

   Blood & soul & skin know we need not ask God to bring us anything. We can, instead, recognize the Thanksgiving that is already before us & within us. 

-Erie Chapman

Days 320-321 Love Holds Us Together

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” –Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

Great God, who has told us
"Vengeance is mine,"
save us from ourselves,
save us from the vengeance in our hearts
and the acid in our souls.

Save us from our desire to hurt as we have been hurt,
to punish as we have been punished,
to terrorize as we have been terrorized.

Give us the strength it takes
to listen rather than to judge,
to trust rather than to fear,
to try again and again
to make peace even when peace eludes us.

We ask, O God, for the grace
to be our best selves.
We ask for the vision
to be builders of the human community
rather than its destroyers.
We ask for the humility as a people
to understand the fears and hopes of other peoples.

We ask for the love it takes
to bequeath to the children of the world to come
more than the failures of our own making.
We ask for the heart it takes
to care for all the people
of this world
as well as for ourselves.

Give us the depth of soul, O God,
to understand
that vengeance begets violence,
and to bring peace--not war--wherever we go.

For You, O God, have been merciful to us.
 patient with us.
 gracious to us.

And so may we be merciful
and patient
and gracious
and trusting
with these others whom you also love.

This we ask through
The One without vengeance of heart
 ~Amen

(Adapted from a prayer written by Sister Joan Chittister)

 

Days 319 - 323 - Magnifying Love Through Photographs

    The most magic word we know is magnified on page 1139  of the Random House Dictionary. "Love" sleeps there with other "L" words like "louse" & "lousy" & "lovage" (a European plant of the parsley family) waiting to be awakened by our attention.

   "A profoundly passionate affection for another person," the first definition reads. Yet, we know that no combination of words can capture what love means to us.

   A photograph is a helpful gift. There are my son & me astride a horse in 1977. The moment he sent this rich memories returned of a day I would have forgotten without the the picture's prompting 

  Below is my son with his son off the Nantucket coast a few years back. For reasons only father's can know, both images break my heart. In each a man protects his offspring.

   Fathers are caregivers too.

   Any of us can magnify a memory from childhood. Most of us forget most moments.

   Pictures can vivify feelings in countless ways.

    

   The more you are present to old images of family & friends the better your chance to deepen your passion.

   Every photograph captures someone no longer that person. Who you & they were in that time is reborn when you see rather than glance. 

   Memories of love need tending lest they be lost. Sometimes only a photograph can retrieve them &, in so doing, make more sacred the fabric from which our lives are woven. 

   Snapshots should never be snap-seen. That is the risk of cell phone shots that, in their profundity, can drown the holiness of any specific image. 

   Those we love have sewn themselves into our hearts. Embroider your life with the golden thread their portraits toss into your hands. 

   Look back. See if you feel in new ways the "profound affection" of love redefined.

-Erie Chapman   

Days 317-318 A Necessary Autumn

 

A Necessary Autumn Inside Each

 

You and I have spoken all these words, but as for the way
we have to go, words

are no preparation. There is no getting ready, other than
grace. My faults

have stayed hidden. One might call that a preparation!
I have one small drop

of knowing in my soul. Let it dissolve in your ocean.
There are so many threats to it.

Inside each of us, there’s continual autumn. Our leaves
fall and are blown out

over the water. A crow sits in the blackened limbs and talks
about what’s gone. Then

your generosity returns: spring, moisture, intelligence, the
scent of hyacinth and rose

and cypress. Joseph is back! And if you don’t feel in
yourself the freshness of

Joseph, be Jacob! Weep and then smile. Don’t pretend to know
something you haven’t experienced.

There’s a necessary dying, and then Jesus is breathing again.
Very little grows on jagged

rock. Be ground. Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up
where you are. You’ve been

stony for too many years. Try something different. Surrender.

 -Rumi

 

Translated by Coleman Barks, The Soul of Rumi

Offered by Liz Sorensen Wessel

Photo: Autumn in New York, Nov 2015 by ~liz 

 

Days 312-316 - Courage & The Trump Effect

Courage is fire, bullying is smoke.  - Benjamin Disraeli

 

   This column is about bullying, not politics. It can affect caregivers in the workplace who face, everyday, a boss who leads with intimidation instead of love.

 

   I saw people like Donald Trump as a child. A bully picked on my sister, who was born with a form of dwarfism. I stepped in. When the bully turned on me I thought others might help. Instead, of course, the other kids shrank back while I fought on.

 

    After that the bully left Martha alone. I became a trial lawyer to protect the vulnerable from injustice. 

 

   Intimidation is an experience we have all shared. A bully attacks his victim with bluster. He or she counts on the likelihood that others will be afraid & is often correct.

 

   The bullying story continues into adulthood. Lawyers call the phenomenon ad hominem arguing - attacking the person not the issue. Thus far, Donald Trump has skewered Jeb Bush for being weak, Carly Fiorina for being ugly, Marco Rubio for "sweating too much," Dr. Ben Carson for lying, Fox reporter Megan Kelly for being a "bimbo," illegal Mexican immigrants for being murderers and rapists and Senator John McCain for being a coward because he was captured (as my cousin, a POW with McCain, knows McCain's heroism shined time & again as a prisoner.)

 

   The shock is not that Trump has practiced bullying but how well it has worked. Trump leads the polls. The problem is that his success has created a sort "Trump Effect." Instead of eschewing this approach, other candidates and even some reporters have sunk so similar tactics. After all, they've seen it work for The Donald. Why not try ad hominem attacks in their own careers? Maybe, they think, fear will work better than love. 

 

   Bullying relies on three things: Personal attacks to humiliate another, the assumption that others will, out of fear, do nothing, and the idea that somehow the bully will gain power and success through this approach. One wonders how much of Trump's success has come through bluster rather than through substance, whether he belongs more on a comedy show than he does in a board room, not to mention The Oval Office. 

  

   Why are millions of Americans going along with this behavior? Consider the history of great American leaders. Can you imagine Trump insulting a too-tall Abe Lincoln, a crippled Franklin Roosevelt or ridiculing George Washington for his false teeth? The attacks might be funny to some but this is demagoguery not leadership. All these leaders received such attacks. Fortunately, the majority of the American public picked loving leadership over spurious attack politics. 

 

   In the 1950s, "The Trump Effect was "The McCarthy Effect". Then Senator Joseph McCarthy ruined the careers of thousands of innocent people by recklessly but effectively branding them Communists. It took three years before lawyer Joseph Welch took on McCarthy after an innocent staffer was attacked. "Have you no shame, Senator?" Welch challenged, as T.V. cameras rolled.

 

   It was the beginning of the end for that bully. But, others always take their places. Work site bullying is a daily terror that saps the life energy of thousands of caregivers.

 

   Each victim hopes one of us will step forward to show that "courage is fire, bullying is smoke" - that you and I will live love, not fear. 

 

-Erie Chapman 

  

Days 310-311 Remembrance

Note: with a heart of remembrance, this loving guest essay is offered by Jolyon Vernon Druce.

The second Sunday in November is Remembrance Day (also known as Veterans Day on November 11th). We pay our respects to those that have lived the military life. When I was in Salt Lake City, Utah last month I stumbled upon a Memory Grove Park that is next to the state capitol. It is a beautiful place. As much a place of monuments to those that served as to an arboretum to shade the plaques. Touching the names touched me to think of all those caregivers that served but were not a part of the military. Doctors Without Borders in Afghanistan is a good example. Giving care to all when the unthinkable happens.                                                                        

 I have a friend that served as a conscientious objector during World War II. He was a Quaker
back then. He worked the lands to help bring our country the national parks we now enjoy. He volunteered to care for the sick and wounded. He cared deeply for humanity.  He became a monk. My father trained others to go out and fight for God and King and many he knew did not come back to renew friendships. My mother listened to Morse code and wrote it down so it could be decoded. We had relatives that were on merchant supply ships that were never heard of again.

I remember them all.
I honor them as their lives honor ours with life and dreams. To caregivers everywhere, I salute you in my prayers.

 

 

 

By-Jolyon Druce

Thank you, Jolyon for your ongoing participation and meaningful contributions to the JSW!

Above photo's by -Jolyon

Days 305-309 - Is Being Good Enough?

   A woman asked a minister, "Is it enough to be a good person or must I join a religion." It is an old but always-fascinating question.

   A missionary nurse in Dallas approached me with a parallel inquiry. "Would you be willing to call my uncle?" she asked. "He is a wonderfully compassionate doctor but he does not believe in religion. He will go to hell. What should I do?"

   "Leave him alone," I told her. "God would never turn away such a loving soul."

   A lawyer asked Jesus: "What does it take to enter paradise?" Jesus reminded the lawyer that he already knew: Love God & your neighbor. "But, who is my neighbor?" the lawyer inquired. 

   The most famous parable in history was born. The Good Samaritan modeled Radical Loving Care. 

   Many might think that all ordained ministers would argue that religion is required for admission to heaven. Not this one.

   Practicing a given faith because you think it gives you an edge in the afterlife is wrong-hearted as well as wrong-headed. Love is not a tit for tat game. 

   Over the centuries the major religions have warned that eternal peace can only be found by practicing the dictates of their religious teaching. Obviously, that can be incredibly helpful in the faith journey. But, do I need to be Catholic, Muslim, Jewish or Hindu in order to gain salvation? 

   Join if you wish. But, do not be surprised if you find paradise turns out to be open to all not a restricted club. 

   What was the religion of the Samaritan? Whatever it was I want to join his group. Those who do not ask how to get into heaven but simply do good. Those who walk the path of love, not fear. 

Reverend Erie Chapman

"The Good Samaritan" - Jan Wijnants