I did Pastoral Care at my local hospital recently. There is a team of us, almost exclusively Christian people, from most of the mainstream churches, who visit people in hospital, from a list compiled by the Hospital Chaplain. The patients must first have consented to a visit, when they filled out the admission paperwork. I always come
away feeling glad to have mingled with all sorts of people.
Some are very ill, like the little girl receiving
Chemo; some are ill from lifestyle
choices; some are in for “repairs”, and
some are just sick from various ailments, like the man who
said he had gout. He told me he was
going home that day and suggested that I might like to take care of him at
home. Hmmm… the thought of doing what
he had in mind, with a 200 kg sleaze was strangely unappealing. And I wanted to
say, as Julia Roberts did, sarcastically, to the book thief who tries to chat
her up in the movie Notting Hill. “thanks… but ….. No”. Instead, I remained doggedly polite and told him that
unfortunately I could only offer pastoral care.
One couple sat by their child’s bedside with a sort of
closed detachment and it wasn't because their child was very ill – he was about
to be discharged. I got the feeling this was their usual state. They were
neither hostile nor pleased. They were absolutely unsmiling and the woman gave
one-syllable answers to my polite attempts at conversation. When I said I was
part of the Pastoral Care team, I don’t think they knew what that was. They were, what would be described in the
middle class world as “rough”, from a low income area, and the woman in
particular, seemed to have a sort of brutish nonchalance about her.
I am still very much learning how to enter only as far into
someone’s personal arena, as they are comfortable with. I never want to intrude
or push them to a place they don’t want to go. I am learning how to gently stand on the barrier of their world
and wait to be trusted enough to be allowed a step further. So I stayed outside their wariness and moved
on. I got the impression that this brief encounter with someone whose outlook
on life held a large cavern of spiritual awareness, was as close a spiritual
encounter as they had ever had. Perhaps for a brief moment the breath of God
wafted near; for them I think it was a completely
unknown arena – they lived their lives completely on the physical plane – and it
doesn’t do to make them step into that other place, unless invited.
Another old gent told me he had, among other things,
mended windmills for a living. He was,
in fact, what’s known as “a jack of all trades” and I always have a sneaking
respect for people like this. I loved
the thought of such a practical and wind-powered (yay!) mechanism being expertly
repaired, out in the stubbled paddocks with the still, hot breath of the bush
all around; the caw of the crows and the
bleat of the sheep, the only sounds.
Sometimes the paddocks would flaunt the exquisite green of newly emerged
grain crops , and sometimes the clack and rattle of the giant harvester would
be tracking it’s way through wheat and canola. I know I’m romanticising it – it
would actually have been very hard work, climbing up and down the windmill and
working with metal which would be so cold in winter and so hot in summer. But I’m sure there were times he would stop
and just absorb the stillness; I know I
would.
And at the end of my visiting, I got a coffee at a nearby coffee place; it's well frequented by all the surrounding medical
community, and I was bemused by the variety of people jostling for space in the
tiny café – the young nurse in navy pants and top getting coffees for a few
others on the ward; the huddle of Very
Important Young Doctors, their stethoscope badges of recognition slung
casually around their necks.
And the group of about 6 young tradies from the new hospital
work-site, all getting their smoko food.
As I walked out they had adjourned to a table outside where they joked
and jostled like school kids – well… they were, after all, not much more than
that. It would never have happened even
a few years ago – this mixing of so very different work groups – tradies and
doctors sharing the same eatery. Love
that.
As I took my coffee away, I ran
into a lady from my church, and her husband, who were seated outside.
She is a very regular attender but he never comes and I hadn't met him
before. After a few minutes my friend
mentioned that she wouldn't be at church on Sunday because she had was having a health issue. He quipped “I’m sure God won’t
mind”. I’m also sure He won’t mind. Her husband added that some people who go to church are
not very nice people. I had to agree
with him there too. (And I couldn't help noticing how quickly the conversation
took a spiritual turn, even though I’d not initiated it; so different from the other couple who had
looked at me with such a blank and disengaged stare).
Some of the nastiest, most cowardly people I've ever met
have been regular churchgoers. It could be the reason that most people don’t go
anymore – because some time in the past they have been bruised by just such a
person. Shame, that.
I try and focus on the nice ones – and they are by far and
away still in the majority – the ones who have allowed the indwelling Christ to
sweeten their souls and give them a love which shows itself in how they treat
others.
I leave the other kind to God, hoping
one day the penny will drop and they will realize Christianity is never so
lifeless as when it’s just a set of rules and “bible-based head knowledge”.
People who live like that can never have their characters refined and sweetened
because they have never connected their souls to the living Christ. It’s about
releasing all we are to the mercy and grace of God, through Christ and the Holy
Spirit, so we grow more and more like him;
rich with the same love and grace.
