Chaplain as a Surgeon

Chaplain as a Surgeon

Chaplaincy

Chaplaincy, in those cases, is like, you know, a doctor and a surgeon. A surgeon is the one that comes in and makes those small slices and attends to that one piece that needs to be removed and it might be something huge that the person would love to keep but they can't. The doctor's is to do the pre-care, the after-care, continual care of the person. A chaplain may have to come in and go into one of those sensitive areas. I had a patient many years ago come in, she, this particular patient was in almost every other month and we're talking over a period of maybe six years. And always wanted prayer, always wanted prayer, looking at the records, always wanted prayer. Every chaplain in the hospital had seen this person. And so one of the things I noticed in the pattern of the conversations with the person, and I think I saw this person more than others but I looked at all the records and the person would always say, 'Pray for the Lord to make it better.' And doesn't that sound great? You know. [muffled voice over intercom] Okay, that's not my unit, okay, I had to . . . So one day, I just said, a request to make it better and this person's brother was in the room, someone who interestingly I had never met. And I said, 'Okay, but could you tell me what is better?' The person looked at me and said, 'What are you talking about?' I said, 'Could you define better for me?' And they said, 'Well what do you mean?' 'You're always asking for the Lord to make it better, but what is better for you? Do you have a sense of what better is?' And the person kind of went to a [confused noise] you know, and had to realize that they were kind of pushing off, that's kind of the language they'd always used but since they could not name the things that would be better, they were stuck in what was not good for them. And it was very interesting. I left the room, the patient was really happy with me at that point, the brother followed me and said, 'Thank you, for kind of breaking that open.' The tradition was 'Pray to the Lord to make it better, always make it better.' 'Well, better than what?' And at the surface it seemed kind of cold, but I thought it was interesting after that, the person had one more admit and then we didn't see that person again for two and a half years. And it was the, you know, the physical issues were in play, but the getting admitted every other month had stopped after that. And I can't say that I'm a miracle worker or anything, but certainly that question pushed them to the edge and the tradition of, you know, just general praying.

Kevin Dowling

Religion Department (Carleton College)

2013

Sound

.mp3 (audio)

C_ChaplainAsSurgeon.mp3

Minneapolis, MN