Speakers address major life issues and how Catholics can deal with them

The subject for speaker Sister Maureen Joyce, RSM, executive director of diocesan Catholic Charities, was "Pregnant and wondering what to do? Who's to help?"

At the other end of the spectrum, Dr. N. Michael Murphy spoke on "The Wisdom of Dying." Dr. Murphy, founding director of the Capital District Psychiatric Center and of the Hospice program at St. Peter's Hospital in Albany, is the author of "The Wisdom of Dying: Practices for Living."

Parishioner Barbara Cheles also shared her own experiences of two family members' time in Hospice. The event was sponsored by the Respect Life committee at St. Teresa's (with support from the Capital Region Pro-Life Council).

Offering help

* Sonia and Bill had two children and no money when Sonia discovered she was pregnant again. She hid the pregnancy for seven months before being referred by a parish priest to Community Maternity Services, a Catholic Charities agency. CMS arranged medical and legal help, and supported the couple when they decided to give their baby up for adoption.

"Ten years ago, we started a program where we have open adoption," Sister Maureen noted. "The mother will meet the adoptive couples, talk about their needs and what she wants her child to know. That is paramount in getting people to consider adoption as an option. We have seen the stigma and the mystery around adoption melt away."

* Tonya, 15, felt unimportant in her family and turned to a 21-year-old man for love. But when she became pregnant, he told her to have an abortion and her parents said that her child was not welcome in their home. She considered suicide. Her school guidance counselor referred her to Catholic Charities, which provided crisis counseling. Tonya kept her baby and lives with her aunt today while she attends school and Catholic Charities' parenting classes.

* Vivien's mother threw her out when the 17-year-old admitted she was five months pregnant. She'd been physically and sexually abused, and her boyfriend disappeared when he learned she was pregnant. Vivien came to live at Catholic Charities' Heery Center, delivered her baby in July and will graduate from high school next June. She wants to be a lawyer to help other people who have been victimized like her.

Choice is life

To a teenager, she said, a baby signifies both adulthood and immortality: "When you're someone's parent, no one will treat you as a child; and if you die young, it's mitigated by the fact that you had a child."

Still, she said, "all is not lost": With time and help, teen parents can become rational individuals. To accomplish this, they need rules to be explained and lessons in critical thinking.

"If teens don't have a clear vision of where they're going, they're easily misled," she noted. "Teens are literally looking for love." If that love isn't forthcoming from their families, "they're content with anyone who shows them affection."

What influences teens most is an adult role model willing to sit down and talk with them, said Sister Maureen. She advised the audience of three dozen St. Teresa's parishioners and others to "never forget the role you have as a caring community. You have something to give back."

Saying goodbye

She remembered that minutes after her mother died, a Hospice worker arrived, planning to play music for her in honor of Valentine's Day.

"You're too late," Ms. Cheles told the worker, but the woman answered, "No, we're not," and sat down with her tape recorder to play the music anyway.

Cherishing life

"Life is short, not to be wasted," he stated. "It urges us not to waste time on hatred, nor on consuming everything in sight."

Hospice has failed, he said, "if it doesn't teach us to start to prepare for death." The "practices for living" described in his book "are practices for us, now."

Whether they admit it or not, Dr. Murphy said, people are overshadowed by the fear of death. "Having accompanied several thousand people [as they were dying], I'm convinced that death is pretty scary," he added. "What about `here and now, and how I'm feeling when Mother's dying'? That is pretty scary stuff."

The doctor feels that it's possible to take "some of the sting off" death and bereavement, so that families are less bereaved when a loved one dies.

Chance to talk

What inevitably happens, he said, is that "we wag our finger at those adolescents. We have no compassion for them. The problem for many in adolescence is that there is no one to witness us -- no one to hear our story."

When a parent or grandparent dies, he continued, children aren't often given the chance to speak to the dying person. This perpetuates the fear of death.

Saying goodbye

As such, he now tells families with a dying member to give each other a blessing. He noted that even a teenager who hasn't gotten along with a dying parent can say, "Dad, you and I missed out on a lot, but now you're dying, and I want to wish you well on your journey," or "it wasn't the greatest, but thank you for being my mother."

"It's terribly important to say goodbye, and we need to say goodbye for a lot longer" than just when someone is dying, he said.

Closing comments

* Rev. Thomas Powers, pastor at St. Teresa's, remarked that the Sacrament of the Sick shouldn't be hidden away, but discussed.

* Dr. Murphy suggested a real celebration of Thanksgiving, letting people give thanks for their blessings, making the holiday "sacramental, rather than gustatory."

* One woman wept as she spoke of her husband's recent death, saying she wished she had heard Dr. Murphy's talk sooner. "Don't for a moment think you've missed your opportunity" to talk to her husband, the doctor advised. He suggested using Thanksgiving as a time to say what hadn't yet been said.

* Another parishioner asked Sister Maureen about volunteer opportunities with Catholic Charities. The director said they were "absolutely" available, noting that the best way to help would be "just to be present" to the young women at Community Maternity Services. "It's really a journey with them," she explained. "Once you sit down and form a relationship, it will evolve."

Afterward, Estelle McKittrick of St. Teresa's Respect Life committee said that she appreciated the speakers' "different slant on what we usually talk about. We usually talk about how terrible things are and what are we going to do about them? [The speakers] all had something positive to say."

Parishioner John MacLutsky told The Evangelist that he planned to use ideas generated during the evening in the classes he teaches at Maria College in Albany. "I'm always trying to stimulate conversation on the culture of life vs. the culture of death," he said.

(Contact Community Maternity Services at 482-5805. Contact St. Peter's Hospice at 454-1686.)

(10-28-99) [[In-content Ad]]