 The buzz on my belt brought an adrenalin rush. The ER was paging and that meant trouble because they don’t call the chaplain when an 11-year-old boy breaks his arm or an elderly woman falls. They call when death is in the house.
I arrived to find Stephen, a middle-aged man, lying on a gurney surrounded by the experienced and efficient ER staff. A CPR tag-team circulated blood through his lifeless body while others placed tubes and IVs and called out regular progress reports. After some time, the lead physician said, ‘I’m calling it. Time of death: 2:14 pm.’
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Thanks to the Northwest Dharma Association for publishing this article about our recent Contemplative Caregiving Retreat. We’re planning a longer follow-up retreat for 2017.
A Day of Exploring Contemplative Caregiving  Grief follows its’ own mind. It sneaks into the house through locked doors, has its way with the furniture, breaks the fine china, and departs on a whim. But it doesn’t retreat far: Just as we’ve finished sweeping the debris, grief returns to overwhelm whatever wall of incense and icons and soft beeswax candles we’re hiding behind and makes us doubt the holy answers. It lingers to wrack our bodies more painfully than an Inquisitor. And even after our breath has relaxed in celebration of its extended absence, we wake once again to feel grief’s great weight next to us in the bed.
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JonpreWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
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