Unending images

At times working in a community service, visiting clients in their own home things can be disturbing. They have been burnt into my mind it seems forever.

In Melbourne probably more than ten years ago I was visiting a palliative client, it was the initial assessment. At the end of the of the interview I was ushered into a bed room: they obviously wanted to show me something. It was a time warp to the seventies.

It's was a teenage girls bed room left exactly as she left it, the day she had died. It had the wallpaper, pictures of the band "Sherbert". Everything screamed seventies. While the rest of the house had moved on, lived in, renovated. This room was a shrine.

I don't know what had happened to this girl, how she died. It seemed obvious that the parents had never gotten over her death. Grief continued to be pushed to the surface in this room.

 

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God has no favourites, but maybe we can change the odds

I have often heard lamented by a relative of how the person who has the life threatening illness lived a good life. Be it through the absence of drugs, healthy lifestyle, the goodness be it within a family or community which they contributed. To be honest it disturbes me; I often feel the distress.

It is obvious that God does not have favourites. That there is a ramdomness of whom God takes before their time. He does not have favourites even those who regularly acknowledge and worship Him no matter how ferverent. I'm often reminded of Forest Gump's line "life is like a box of chocolates", there is a randomness in death; which at times I think we can change the odds.

It would appear that lifestyle can change the odds. Moderation with alcohol, eating healthily, positive relationships within and outside the family. I would also write a centeredness which is often found in Church or wherever people slow down and have time to contemplate. The thing though even with these positives in a persons life it dosn't guarente anything. It just lowers the odds.

There is a quote going around at the moment by a Sioux Indian Vine Deloria::

"Religion is for people who are afraid of going to Hell

Spirituality is for those who have already been there"

I like it; there is an idea for me that Heaven has already been touched, it has been experienced. That there is no more fear to be had through death. Its not about somthing unknown on the other side. It is somthing about life, beauty, joy.....

This I would think is the biggest way in which we can change the odds.

 

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Hope

Hope is a strange thing. You don't know that you need to think about it usually until it is to late. The Sh#t has has already hit the fan.

I did my major Old Testement essay on the afterlife. It was obscure, many scholars infusing New Testement ideas into the Old. But from what I could gather Jews from the Old Testement did not believe in a heaven as such. There was sheol the place for the dead, but it was no heaven. A waiting room, waiting for the messiah. Maybe a new earth, but not the Christian equivalent of heaven. The Old Testements ideas of the afterlife  are full of metaphors which many things can be read into.

Was the ideas of heaven even in the Old Testement? Old Testement scholars argue and point to obsure references, which then become clearer when the New Testement came along. But just reading the unadulterated text I'd say no. Heaven, the glorious afterlife didn't exist. 

One Jewish idea from the Old Testement was that new life or eternity was given though the Childern. Hope for the future after death was found in Children; if not your own maybe your brothers or some other relative. 

So if you where given a diagnosis of terminal cancer; a hopeless situation. What would you do? Where would your hope come from?

The hope of heaven, which nobody has even come back to tell us about?

or

To look at the face of a child and see hope?

I don't know. Both are appealing yet not fully satisfying.

For me when I am in a hopeless situation, and I admit I have never faced a life threatening situation. I look at psalm 23. For me it is very much the here and now. To be remined, centered. That God's presence is here, now. That that His presence is a place of peace. That God, in his nature, eventually turns troubled times, into good. Even if we cannot see it happening now or into the future. 

 

Psalm 23

A psalm of David.

 ¹ The LORD is my shepherd, I lack nothing. 
 ² He makes me lie down in green pastures, 
he leads me beside quiet waters, 
 ³ he refreshes my soul. 
He guides me along the right paths 
   for his name’s sake. 
⁴ Even though I walk 
   through the darkest valley,^[a] 
I will fear no evil, 
   for you are with me; 
your rod and your staff, 
   they comfort me.

 ⁵ You prepare a table before me 
   in the presence of my enemies. 
You anoint my head with oil; 
   my cup overflows. 
⁶ Surely your goodness and love will follow me 
   all the days of my life, 
and I will dwell in the house of the LORD 

 

Death, Nursing and God's presence.

If you were to ask me out of the two professions which I have studied and worked, which gave me a greater feeling of God's presence? I would say for sure during my time as a nurse in palliative care. 

I read somewhere (and for the life of me I cannot find out where), that during the middle ages when a person was extremely close to death; there would be a multitude of people wanting to be near the dying person at the moment of life's extinction. The reason was that there was a belief that you could catch a glimpse of heaven as the person died and went to heaven. This was a phenomenon which people longed for; a look, even for an instant of heaven. 

While I have not have seen a wink of heaven. I have felt at times a presence, the supernatural; God. More times during nursing I have felt God through his people (in a univeral sence). In their extremes of incredible pain, conflct, turmoil. For me there is a presence, which helps me to be centred; even if the other participants in the events do not know it.

The studying of Scripture or the participation in worship I never had these expereinces of the presence of God. Scripture did help me focus, to reflect on God. Worship through liturgy would do the same. Charismatic worship would come close but there was to much manipulation to be real, for me. You can get the same buzz from a rock concert...

It is the God of the everyday which I wish to engage with. Nursing is good at that. The God of real life. Admittedly church helps me to focus and relflect on God, a reminder, of his characteristics. But as a replacement, to God of the everyday. No I actually think this is wrong. To seek God's face is an everyday experience. Not to be compentmentalised on a Sunday morning.

The last goodbye

Often when a person is at the last stage of their disease and dying they are in an altered state of consciousness. Most people understand consciousness as either awake or asleep. Yet there are ranges of consciousness that most people don't give much thought to. We can often be in an altered state of consciousness when we are waking in the morning or just when we are going to sleep. These are often times when our dreams are most vivid. A time when we are neither awake or asleep, yet a place where activity continues.
During my time as a palliative care nurse I've often been with people who are in these altered states. Most palliative care nurses who have worked in the field long enough would agree, that helping a loved one move from this life often involves 'giving permission' to die and saying goodbye. Usually this scenario is where a person is in an altered state of consciousness. This unconscious state could be for hours or days. What frequently happens is that the person who has been given 'permission' dies within hours.
My understanding of this behaviour is that a person is in an altered state of consciousness. They are still able to process information around them as well as internally. It is in my opinion a sacred space. A place where healing can still occur. (not cure) I don't think it is a co-incidence that frequently people in these states will still be alive until a loved one is next to their bedside, or they die at a particular time or wait until Christmas.
Saying good bye it is often the hardest words ever said. Yet it is often the most freeing for the person experiencing eminent death.
Most my understanding of this topic I've experienced during my work in palliative care, yet there are number resource if one wishes to explore the topic more fully.
::One book which I would recommend is by Australian Dr Michael Barbato a Palliative care physician, Reflections of a setting sun.

The percentages

Working in a secular setting is interesting. After a while you get to know where people sit, if they are aware of the spiritual, their opinion on the Church, Christianity, Buddhism etc etc.

I think as a very rough guide for my co-workers

20% antagonistic toward the Church and very cynical. They usually come out when the media reveals a 'Christian Nutter'. The Bushfires in Victoria was a good example and the 'Nutter' saying  it was God's vengence... Well the ward that I was working on, if you where a Christian you hung low.
Strangely I found it is rare to find an atheist, maybe an agnostic.

60% Apathetic towards the Church. Not really wanting to go, yet thinks Churches and Christians are ok. Possibly the easiest to get into a Church community.
Yet I think there are things keeping them back, they know that they may not scrub up to perceived Christian values and doctrine.  For example they are not married yet living with a partner. They believe that Homosexuals should have the right to marriage.  Clairvoyants are ok they have actually been to a few. They don't believe in a virgin birth.
In truth there a huge amount.

20% Actually go to Church, and talk of Christian things occasionally. Yep I'm in this group, though sympathise with the %60 often.

Out of all of the groups  most are very spiritual, they understand mystery and beauty. The wonder to be alive. Maybe this is a nurses fate where often death can visit those you look after and at the end of the shift you wonder why.

Spiritual Awakening

I've finished with reading 'Adrian Mole and the weapons of Mass destruction'. He is a funny very English fellow.

The end of the book was significant. It was a 'Born Again' or if you like 'Spiritual awakening', for 'Moley.'

I suppose there are certain things that need to happen with this type of experience. An acknowledgement that you don't always get things right. A repentance and a turning away from the old ways. For 'Moley' this was a couple of things. There where no wepons of 'Mass destruction'. His fincances where a debarckel and he needed to change this.

The other aspect is there has to be a higher power or person, to assist in the turning, the process of repentance. For Moley it was Mr Carlton-Hayes. In the book Mr Carlton-Hayes can do no wrong. In the end Moley actually confides all his problems to him. In listening, taking Moley seriously, he helps Moley navigate a way forward out of his mess of a life style.

In life I think there can be many of these life changing moments. I'd call them supernatural in that God interacts in the moment. For me I've had 2 or 3. The first would have to be 'Alter Call', but there have been more and certainly not as proscribed.

I've also seen it happen for people on deaths door. The last days of life, when previously there was anxiety and worry. Then a turn around and peace. An acceptance of things to come. Strangely when you find this there is a job satisfaction. I would also point out that it was rarely to do with a 'organised religious' experience.

A beautiful Story

Mark Connors, quoted a recent small speech that Billy Graham gave. It is a beautiful story. Well crafted and a catchy finish. Much like a you find in science fiction short stories. Yet now reading it I find that Billy Graham has made some presumptions about his audience, here is the story...

‘I’m reminded today of Albert Einstein, the great physicist who  this month has been honored by Time magazine as the  Man of the Century. Einstein was once traveling from  Princeton on a train when the conductor came down the  aisle, punching the tickets of every passenger. When he  came to Einstein, Einstein reached in his vest pocket. He  couldn’t find his ticket, so he reached in his trouser pockets.  It wasn’t there, so he looked in his briefcase but couldn’t find it.  Then he looked in the seat beside him. He still couldn’t find it.

The conductor said, ‘Dr. Einstein, I know who you are.  We all know who you are. I’m sure you bought a ticket.  Don’t worry about it.’

Einstein nodded appreciatively. The conductor continued  down the aisle punching tickets. As he was ready to  move to the next car, he turned around and saw the great  physicist down on his hands and knees looking under his  seat for his ticket.

The conductor rushed back and said, ‘Dr. Einstein,  Dr. Einstein, don’t worry, I know who you are No problem.  You don’t need a ticket.  I’m sure you bought one.’

Einstein looked at him and said, ‘Young man, I too, know who I am.  What I don’t know is where I’m going.”

:: I suppose with my work especially in palliative care I came to the conclusion that most people were not really interested in where they are going. More they were concerned about life even short would be peaceful, pain free  and there family and relationships are at peace.

:: Many people of different cultures and faiths have just as much 'certainty' as Billy Graham. 

:: In my opinion most 'Australians' have a good understanding of 'pluralism'. When reading the story most Australians would just think it is just Christian 'Fundamentalism'. It is a story which would have worked 20 years ago without living in a multicultural society: but not now.

So what do I think...Yep I think Billy is right some idea of where we are going is important. It is part of the matrix of life that within us where is a desires for the Divine, to meet, and be with our maker. What I find troubling with Billy Grahams story is the presumptions come  in an evangelical package.