Journal of Sacred Work

Days 244-248 - A Life & Death Hypothetical

   In public speeches & private conversations over twenty years I have often suggested a hypothetical: If an angel descended to offer you perfect health to age 80 & a peaceful death on your eightieth birthday would you take the deal?

   Lucky that my always-healthy 105 year old mother did not. She was eighty twenty-five years ago! But most audiences under 65 snap it up instantly!

   This game can help us highlight what matters to us. Caregivers, including a critical care doctor & nurse anesthetist I spoke with recently, have seen too much pain in other's lives to want to risk more in their own.

   They & other caregivers are drenched in other's sicknesses every day. The prospect of perfect health & a peaceful death is more tempting then longevity. 

   Beyond pain most people fear the loss of control & the anxiety they see in the faces of nursing home inmates & chronically ill hospital patients. Have you ever met someone who says, "I'd prefer to die on a ventilator surrounded by strangers or wandering confused down a linoleum hallway."

   It is because no angel can deliver my deal that Radical Loving Care is so desperately important. No caregiver can  guarantee good health. But they can offer the healing presence that eases loneliness & fear.

-Erie Chapman

"Angel Descending Through Water & Fire." (Photoart Montage by Erie, 2017.) 

Days 242-243 Last Days of Summer

Note: Guest reflection by Woody Wessel

 Well summer is coming to an end. Labor Day approaches   school has or is about to start again.

  You may wonder what to do on that last real weekend of the summer?

In the City of Orange the people came up with an Idea about forty five years ago, of having a street fair for three days in the middle of old town around the plaza .  I believe they thought it would bring in people to the downtown area eat at restaurants and of course shop.  The theme of the fair was a national one (since it was started about the time of the bicentennial).  The fair combines many the different cultures that make up not only Orange, but America as a whole. 

For three days you can wander the downtown area and eat food and listen to music from many of the different cultures that
help make up this country.

In this small way the City of Orange helps remind us that we all came from many different places near and far.

Yet we are all Americans, whether your people came from Ireland,  China or anywhere else in the wide world.

We all enjoy the same rights.  All are equal under our laws. We have no kings no lords, or permanent ruling class.

In this county there is only one aristocracy.  That of the mind. One can go as far as their will and drive can take them.

  Look at President Obama or Bill Gates in our time. Before them there were many others, too many to count.

So take some time this upcoming Labor Day weekend and come to the street fair and remember in this

country out of many; one.

P.S. Myself, I go for the many wonderful beers from around the world.

Woody Wessel

Days 237-241 - 105 Years of Grace

   If she were a flower, she would be a gardenia. If a piano concerto, Rachmaninoff’s 2^nd.

   Were she a bird, she would be among the rarest: an Indigo Bunting. If a soap, sandlewood. As a mother, she is one word: grace.

   On August 21, as the total eclipse cuts America on the bias, my grace-filled mother turns 105. Molly Chapman had to live more than a century to experience this astronomical magic. At the rate she is going she will make the next eclipse in 2024.

   But, "light" has been blocked many times during mom's life. She was born in 1912, the year the Titanic sank (We like to call her "The Unsinkable Molly.")

    She has witnessed the sun's emergence from other moonless nights. On a November day in 1918, in World War I's wake, six-year-old Molly watched the sun glint off the bayonets of returning American soldiers parading through her home town of Elyria, Ohio. 

   In 1920 mom recalls Miss Smythe lighting up the same town with her new electric auto. "Through the cars big glass windows you could see a daisy smiling from a built-in vase on the dashboard," she recalled.   

   One night in 1930 she descended dark steps to knock on the door of an actual Speakeasy. It was owned by gangster "Umbrella Mike" Boyle. She was an eighteen-year-old freshman at Northwestern University. Herbert Hoover was President.

   The Depression eclipsed 1930's America. But, her father's wealth lit a safe path for young Molly. Through those days she rode in a 16 cylinder Lincoln. Live-in maids cooked dinner & cleaned. 

   In 1943, during the Hitler-birthed nightmare of World War II, mom birthed me. "Nothing is more important than family," this ultimate caregiver says. Her sixty year marriage, four children, four grandchildren & nine great grandchildren suggest that. Her enduring love proves it.   

   It is age itself that mom has transcended. So many of us slice years off our lives by resisting change. The only things mom has resisted (graciously, of course) are poor grammar & coarse behavior.

   If there is a secret to her longevity other than genes it has been that supreme graciousness. Like the first tenet of the famous prayer, she has shown "the grace to accept things [she] cannot change."

   This beautiful trait has been a constant for Molly Chapman for 105 years. The photographs suggest it. Her life proves it. 

-Erie Chapman

 

 

Days 235-236 Behind The Curtain

“The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was a bigger than life story during the days of my childhood.  

Dorothy was lost and wanted to find home again. Her companions  were all looking for something precious that was seemingly lost or perhaps never quite attained.

She made friends along the way and they journeyed together to find the one thing they longed for most in life; a home, courage, a brain and a heart for love. They followed that yellow brick road, to seek out the great wizard, for surely, he who was all powerful could give them the one treasure they all desperately sought.

On the hero’s quest they encountered many perils, which was frightening to me as a child. I was terrified of the wicked witch and her cadre of flying monkeys, her foreboding crystal ball and those creepy forest trees that tried to pull them into their evil clutches.

Ah, but the good witch, Glenda was all sparkling and glowing with Light. She was kind and encouraging as she offered her wisdom to help guide their way.  Risking great dangers they finally made it to the Emerald City to ask the omnipresent wizard to help and give them the one treasure that would make them whole.

Alas, to their great disappointment the powerful wizard was just an ordinary man. Oh, the shock and dismay. An ordinary man hiding behind a facade of greatness, a persona built up over a lifetime.

This morning the great wizard of Oz was in my thoughts. For you see, I know what it feels like to be the wizard. To wonder, what if people looked behind the curtain to see the REAL me. The ordinary, unadorned, sometimes boring, not so artistic me, they too would be disappointed.  Just like Dorothy and her friends, on some level, I too believe that there is something is lacking in me; a sense of worthiness.

There is a sense of shame and embarrassment when the mask falls and the facade crumbles but in our vulnerability we can find new strength to claim our truth. Not in self recriminations but in the reality of what we are, born of love and returning to love. Our lives bring us full circle.

The moral of this classic story teaches us that our struggle to complete ourselves is to recover what lies hidden. Eventually our pursuit brings us home, transformed by our experience and the wonderful people we have met along the way.

Our treasure is not found in isolation but rather in relationship. For it is only then that we discover the redemptive power of Love.  I am grateful for how much those I love enrich my life in meaningful ways. And when I act like the wicked witch and my perceptions become all skewed, I am sorry for the hurt I cause myself and others.  It is only through the grace of forgiveness for ourselves and others that we learn how to truly love.

Liz Sorensen Wessel

Days 229-234 - The House of the Spirit

   No one can build a house from the roof down. Houses are built from the ground up. We all know that. 

 We also know that homes are built from the inside out - from the touches that personalize where we live. From the relationships that create meaning amid walls, floors & the roof above our heads.

We build our work homes that way as well. Doctors & nurses spend so much of their lives in hospitals & hospices that those places become second homes. 

What about the house of the spirit? Is that built from the roof down? Do our spiritual homes even have a roof?

The image was taken from the 1988 film, "The Last Temptation of Christ." Jesus sits in the desert "building" his home from the brick & mortar of God's Love so that it will serve him on earth as well as heaven. Among his tools are courage, patience, faith & sacrifice - the same tools we need to build the kind of spiritual home that will shelter us during out earth journey.  

What of nutrition? Only living water can quench our thirst. Only love can make us whole. 

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Days 227-228 Bending the Arc of the Universe

Note: This powerful and important message was written by John Pavlovitz and I just had to share it with you... Do not lose heart!
~Liz Sorensen Wessel

MAY 18, 2017 / JOHN PAVLOVITZ

“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

In 1871, Unitarian minister Theodore Parker first spoke these words in opposition to slavery here in America.

In 1958 Dr Martin Luther King Jr. repeated them to a nation still fighting for equality for all its people.

In this day of uncertainty and grief, these words desperately need to be repeated again, though not as solace for weary spectators—but as battle cry for warriors.

We who occupy this space and time need to understand that the arc of the universe does not bend without us. It never has. It never will.

Humanity is the irresistible force shaping the crescent we stand upon together; every single life and every infinitesimal, seemingly unimportant decision adjusts its path in ways we can’t always perceive. With each decision, the curvature changes ever so slightly. It is changing in the seconds it takes me to read these words, and you to hear them. Every single moment is a movement, one way or the other.

Friends, this means that we are the arc benders.

We are not passive victims of the difficult times in which we live, we are powerful participants in them; mighty co-authors of the story we find ourselves in, and together we can twist the plot. We can write something redemptive to mark this day on the planet.

With each beat of our bleeding hearts and every breath passing through our scorched lungs; as we speak and struggle, pushback and pray, resist and engage—the universe bows a bit more. With each act of love, each word of truth, each brave step, justice comes a little closer.

Yes, the arc of the moral universe is long, and we may not see all the movement we wish to see while we are here, but make no mistake—it will bend far less severely and far more slowly if we simply wait for it to do so.

And while we are waiting, others may decide that we are bending too quickly toward equality and diversity, and they may move in opposition, arching us away from the progress of our forebears. And if we are not diligent and relentless and steadfast with these moments, we risk leaving those who come after us, a world that is veering off course.

This is why we keep going now. It is why we brave the difficult conversations and the exhausting days and the sleepless nights. It’s why we don’t sit in the comfort of our privilege, and why we face this day with urgency: because people of love will hasten the bending if they choose to. 

And I choose to.

I want to be an arc bender.

I want to live leaned toward justice.

I want my choices in the small and the grand to contribute to the holy momentum of the planet.

I want my presence here to yield more compassion, more goodness, more decency than when I arrived.

I want my abundance and privilege to be spent on behalf of those who have less of such things.

I want to spend the remaining of my days shoulder to shoulder with other passionate, resolute arc benders, deliberately altering the curvature of the universe toward justice, by the sweat of our brows and the defiance of a love that will not cease.

We don’t wait for the Universe to bend, my friends.

We move together—and we bend it.

Blessed are the arc benders.

Be encouraged. 

 By John Pavlovitz

 Drawing By ~liz

Days 222-226 - Freeing The Soul

 
 I minister to a convicted killer. He lives behind real bars. We are free. Or are we?

   Most of us are inmates in our own physical or emotional prisons. Consider those trapped in wheelchairs or suffering from ALS or blindness or raw poverty.

   A paralyzed person can, of course, be freer than an Olympic sprinter. Fear is the great jailer.

   Three centuries before Christ, Aristotle said that the only path to freedom was to overcome fear. Freedom may be free, but it is not cheap.

   "You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having both at once," Robert Heinlein wrote. 

   Your bad boss walks into the room & your spirit is paralyzed. A piece of your soul breaks off every time you give in to such terror. How much of freedom is sold to sustain our lifestyle? Do we lug around financial debt like a ball and chain?

   Agoraphobia walls its sufferers in their own homes. Depression can convert life into a jail where the only exit may look like suicide. 

   Elbert Hubbard wrote that "Freedom cannot be bestowed, it must be achieved." How?

   It begins by recognizing that freedom's price is struggle & its currency is courage. Frederick Douglas knew that: "Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground."

   When Jesus said the truth would set us free he meant the truth of God's Love. Because that love is often painful the price is high. It demands the courage to hold fast to our dreams against the endless seductions of surrender. None of us can live free unless we find the bravery to live love, not fear.    

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Photograph: "Nina Imprisoned" by Erie

 

Days 220-221 Would You Bring Dirty Dishes?

  “When we relate to our bodies as having soul, we attend to their beauty, their poetry and their expressiveness. Our very habit of treating the body as a machine, whose muscles are like pulleys and its organs engines, forces its poetry underground, so that we experience the body as an instrument and see its poetics only in illness.”

― Thomas Moore, Care of the Soul: A Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life

 

 Note: Reflection by Liz Sorensen Wessel. When I was ten I almost died. My mom called Dr. Cahill's office early Monday morning to report my symptoms; intense headache, malaise and unrelenting vomiting. Dr. Cahill came to our home to examine me and soon I was whisked away by ambulance to Misericordia Hospital.  I was diagnosed with meningitis and for the first 3 days my life hung in the balance.

I did not know then, how my brush with death at such a tender age, would shape the course of my life.  Many years passed before I fully understood my mother’s profound influence on me. She stayed by my side in my darkest hour to quell my fears and comfort my soul. I remember her telling me, “I wish I could trade places with you.” My experience of her loving presence in a time of suffering was a cherished gift. Although, I had no words for it, on a deeper level of knowing, I seemed guided to be with people facing a serious illness or at end of life.

Although, as a young nurse I was scared and my first instinct was to turn and run, I realized that this was when people needed someone to be there with them, more than ever.

As caregivers we are invited into people’s lives at very difficult times to bear witness to not only suffering but to tremendous love. People can call upon unfathomable reserves of inner strength, which manifest through the power of Love.

In Erie Chapman’s extraordinary July 31^st essay “Days 215-219 - Caring for the Caregiver's Soul,”as well as in his ground breaking book, “Radical Loving Care," he posits the essential need to care for the soul.  As I reflect on how to apply this wisdom in my life, the importance of grief work surfaces.  I remember the day when the incomprehensible news came. My eldest brother, Phillip as killed in a car accident, the same day as my best friend’s wedding and I was to be her maid of honor. I decided to attend the wedding, which was an extremely strange and surreal experience, as I went through the motions of the day.

In the morning, my brother Johnny and I left New York to join our family in Vermont. Phillip’s funeral was the next day and after the service I took a long plane trip to CA. A kind, older gentleman talked with me the entire trip. I remember we spoke of deeply meaningful things. (Death has a way of lifting the veil if only for a short time). I am so grateful for the caregiving he provided to me that night.  

The following day,  I started my very first nursing job on the oncology unit at St Joseph Hospital. I was 22 and no one knew me, my family or what had just occurred. I did not know how to grieve so I just immersed myself in caregiving as I tried to support people who were grappling with life and death situations. Helping them, helped me.

 Looking back I wonder how I survived those days. I guess I focused on meeting the needs of others. The patients and families I cared for taught me about the sacredness of living and dying. In 1995, when my dad succumbed to cancer and died, I understood the the necessity of grieving and bleeding off some of the pain of loss by expressing love through   journaling and drawing mandalas. These days I also find exercise a great stress reducer and each morning I ground myself with a devotional and/or meditation.  

Recently, a colleague at work asked me. "Liz, how are you doing at separating your work life from your home life?" Joyfully, he shared how he has come to completely separate the two. Admittedly, I confessed that I’ve been taking work home at night and on weekends. He said to me, “I wonder what people would think if you brought your laundry to work or perhaps your dirty dishes to wash? “Well”, I said, rather dumbfounded, “I could never even imagine it!” “So, how is that any different from you bringing your work home?” he asked. “Wow, What a powerful analogy”, I said.  Those particular images have really stuck with me as I try, or as Erie suggests to find a balance between the “caregiving and caretaking" of one another's souls.

By Liz Sorensen Wessel

Drawings; my parents mandala &Vermont home ~by Liz