April 6, 2018 at 1:53 p.m.
OUR NEIGHBOR'S FAITH
Ecumenism and pastoral care
At Albany Medical Center, much attention is given to these topics, but it is less about dialogue and more about actually ministering with ecumenical chaplains. It is the practical way we provide pastoral care to our patients, their families and the staff.
We receive thousands of requests a year for pastoral care visits. We show up at hundreds of crisis scenes when people are rushed to the hospital.
We are staffed with many Clinical Pastoral Education interns and residents, some pastoral care staff members and many trained, loyal volunteers. These spiritual care providers represent a great variety of faith traditions and practices.
We do not have the luxury of assigning Presbyterian patients to Presbyterian chaplains, Catholics to Catholic chaplains and so on. Specific requests - for example, communion or the Sacrament of the Sick - are referred to a priest or eucharistic minister.
But the initial visit is made by the on-call chaplain, who may be a rabbi, a Catholic, an imam or a Protestant. The initial visit may lead to many more visits with this chaplain.
Living on this small globe, what we hold in common outweighs our differences. This commonality includes how we react to grief and loss. Facing the loss of a child, getting a frightening diagnosis or waiting for news about a loved one in the emergency room, we react in predictable ways.
We cry out with lamentation. We raise hard theological questions in hospital corridors: "Why is God doing this to me?"
The chaplain listens, offers support and ascertains the individual's spiritual resources. Often, prayer is requested. It is not uncommon in this ecumenical and interfaith setting for the chaplain who is Jewish to pray with a Christian or with a Muslim.
The imam meets a woman whose son has died, and he is reminded of his own losses. She asks for prayer and he offers a beautiful and compelling prayer for which she is very grateful.
Those who become immersed in ecumenical pastoral care discover that what they hold in common with their fellow chaplains is considerably more than the differences between them. They also discover that their spiritual concerns are not all that different than those of the patients they serve.
There are common spiritual needs and issues present for every human being: awe or contempt as a way of viewing the world; the meaning of one's life, calling or vocation; the need for a community, for communion; facing the end of one's life; and, "Is there anything or anyone in whom I can place faith and hope?"
Since the patient and the pastoral care provider both face these issues, it is common for deep conversations to surface as the patient or family begins to cope with illness or death.
Frequently, patients and chaplains express amazement and joy over what has taken place in the pastoral visit. This ecumenical and interfaith ministry brings added gifts to both patient and chaplain, as they learn from and about each other.
Finally, ecumenical pastoral care for the sick is a peacemaking activity. These spiritual encounters break stereotyping habits and erase the misconceptions and suspicions we too often carry regarding those we do not know.
(Rev. Dr. Ratmeyer is a clergyman with the Reformed Church in America and a Chaplain at Albany Medical Center.)[[In-content Ad]]
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