PlainViews

Daniel Coleman on religious care in a disaster area

Care for the Caregivers

In May, I had the privilege of participating in a week-long mission based in Biloxi and Gulfport on the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. The mission was funded by a grant from the UJA Federation of New York and organized in conjunction with F.E.G.S and other sister agencies. Our primary task was to assess whether - and how - some of the support services provided in New York could be transplanted to Mississippi to assist in the long-term recovery of the region. Additionally, our group will soon be visiting Washington DC to advocate for the unmet needs that we identified during meetings with social service providers, city administrators, and interfaith disaster forces.

Everyone we encountered thanked us for bearing witness to the devastation that Katrina and its aftermath continues to wreak over hundreds of miles of land, thousands of businesses and tens of thousands of homes. Everyone we met inspired us by their individual and collective attempts to rebuild their fragmented homes, lives and hopes - even with this year's hurricane season right around the corner.

One day of our visit, we teamed up with Americorps volunteers who have spent much of the last nine months collecting data from every household along the Coast. At the end of each day, every survey we collected was entered into a computer, triaged to determine the urgency of unmet needs, and assigned to a case-manager who worked to connect each household with organizations that could help to fill those needs.

Prior to this assignment, we were given an orientation by the chair of the Long-Term Recovery Committee for the County. Among the instructions that we received was "no religion." As a chaplain, I did not agree with this policy; nevertheless, I realized and respected that I was a visitor working within an "alien" system. Before pairing off to conduct our house-to-house surveys, I approached the Chair and explained to her that my chaplaincy training included the ability to discuss faith in non-proselytizing and unthreatening ways and to offer spontaneous custom-made prayers that were designed to alleviate spiritual distress. She did not relent from her original position.

However, she grasped the importance of prayer and told me that "my staff could really use your prayers right here." I asked her what she would like to pray for, knowing that the majority of relief coordinators and case managers that we had spoken to thus far were overwhelmed with the burdens of those they provided for and that they came home each night to rebuild their own homes, families and lives. As she talked of her concerns, we were joined by a newly pregnant social worker and another senior member of her team who needed no invitation to join us in prayer. In turn, they asked for strength and courage to help others, the health of her unborn baby, compassion, and renewed hope. We wrapped our arms around each other and stood in a tight circle as I asked the Divine Source of Life to grant us each our requests along with continued help in facing the personal and communal challenges that lay on the long road ahead. I concluded by asking the Divine Presence to manifest in the work of our hands. We parted company in silence as we turned back to engage our individual tasks of rebuilding life in Mississippi.

Daniel Coleman is completing a CPE Residency at The HealthCare Chaplaincy, serving a mental-health population at FEGS Intensive Psychiatric Rehabilitation Treatment Program (IPRT) in Manhattan. He is also completing Rabbinic ordination at Yeshivah University in New York City.

Do you have thoughts about professional practice you’d like to share with your colleagues? Send an e-mail info@PlainViews.org.

Editor’s note: As with the last issue, we have chosen to include the continuing responses to Dr. Hamdy’s article, “Spirituality and Medicine”that appeared in the June 21 issue of PlainViews (Education & Research,Vol. 3, No. 10). These responses continue to raise this issue that is of great importance to the chaplaincy profession. PlainViews encourages chaplains to write and participate in raising the level of professionalism, awareness and understanding with other disciplines that interact with chaplains. Therefore, the decision was made to again include these comments in place of an article.

I read the responses of Susan Wintz and Mark LaRocca-Pitts to Dr. Ronald Hamdy's invitation for chaplains to attend an upcoming conference that promotes dialogue between those who practice medicine as their primary area of expertise and those who provide spiritual care as their vocation. I checked the website that provided details regarding the curriculum and faculty and laud the efforts of the Southern Medical Association in sponsoring this event.

However, I share the concerns of my peers that none of the faculty are trained providers of spiritual care at the bedside. The conference outline includes case studies that will include discussions that are led by physicians. Chaplains will be invited, per Dr. Hamdy, to "establish their claims and correct any misconception." Yet, the whole paradigm sets up the physician's perspective as normative and the chaplain's perspective as corrective or offered as a contribution from the floor (rather than a core starting point). Regrettably, the SMA leadership wants a "dialogue" but it does not appear to be founded on seeing professional chaplains as equal partners in this process. The lack of theologically trained board certified chaplains among the faculty, but instead sitting among the assembled participants, sends a symbolic message about our not being viewed as colleagues in the healing process. The case studies especially could have benefited from an experienced chaplain, who has a focus in medical ethics, leading the discussion alongside a physician. Such a partnership would demonstrate the reality that a good physician, upon recognition of a pivotal spiritual or religious concern, would make a referral to a qualified chaplain...just as he or she, upon noting a significant respiratory problem, would call upon a pulmonologist consult.

I also have a small concern that the conference has an overriding goal for physicians "to integrate spirituality in the day-to-day management of patients and disease." The risk here is that a physician may bring his or her own spirituality to bear on the patient's condition, or attempt to respond to a patient's spiritual needs without the appropriate level of training to do so effectively. I applaud the desire to increase sensitivity to the patient's spiritual needs, yet wonder if we are asking physicians to move outside of their area of expertise if asking them to personally address these concerns when they arise.

To be fair to Dr. Hamdy, this is a physician sponsored event rather than a joint effort. Perhaps we should consider this a welcome forum for educating physicians about the spiritual needs of patients. The presence of board certified chaplains as participants at the event will go a long way in educating attending physicians about our expertise and value in addressing the spiritual needs of their patients. I hope that the APC will consider having a booth, alongside The Healthcare Chaplaincy and ACPE, so that we can seize an opportunity to educate, dialogue, and contribute to this event. Perhaps the next event will include a BCC as faculty due to our contributions as participants this year.

Alex Chamberlain, BCC
Staff Chaplain
St. Luke's Meridian Medical Center
Meridian, Idaho

After reading these responses, I looked at the program too. I was surprised to see a conference with all white male presenters. Especially in the chaplaincy field which has emphasized diversity. Also as other writers have noted, it seems to be specifically Christian as is Dr. Koenig.

Bob Keim, Chaplain
Anoka-Metro Regional Treatment Center
3301 - 7th Avenue No.
Anoka, MN

I read with great interest the comments made in the Advocacy section of PlainViews Vol. 3 No. 11. While much progress has been made, it is apparent that there is a long way yet to go, in respect to incorporating the services of professional board certified chaplains in a truly interdisciplinary health care environment. I would have hoped that Dr. Hamdy would have heard Rev. Wintz's assertion that the conference in question falls short of encouraging dialogue when board certified chaplains are not included among the faculty. I am especially concerned by his comment, "Rather than having 'professional chaplains' discuss what they may have to offer, it was felt to be of greater impact if these comments were made by the consumer, i.e., the physician who has witnessed, utilized, worked with, and come to appreciate the value of the 'professional chaplain.'"

While I do not presume to speak for Rev. Wintz, I am familiar enough with what she has contributed to the growth of professional chaplaincy to know that she is not proposing an either/or scenario which calls for a faculty made up solely of board certified chaplains, but rather a scenario that includes board certified chaplains among the faculty. As for Dr. Hamdy's assertion that the conference content would have "greater impact" with a faculty made up entirely of physicians, I respectfully and adamantly disagree. In my view, the participant is far more likely to be influenced by seeing physicians and chaplains interact around a single topic. I hope that Dr. Hamdy and others, who plan for such conferences in the future, will not take the feedback from Rev. Wintz as "disappointing," but rather as an encouragement to include professional board certified chaplains as faculty for such conferences.

Mark Pruitt, M.Div., BCC
Staff Chaplain
Department of Pastoral Care
Centra Health
Lynchburg, VA

As a hospice chaplain, I, too, was excited to read about the Medicine/Spirituality conference at Emory University. However, as soon as I saw the list of presenters, I concluded this was a physical medicine conference, not inclusive of chaplains. I quickly crossed it off my list of educational opportunities to consider attending. Dr. Hamdy denies this is so; perhaps the descriptive material lacks the information needed to convey to chaplains that their field and concerns are integral to the conference.

It was interesting reading Chaplain Wintz's and Dr. LaRocca-Pitts' response to the article by Dr. Hamdy. I would agree that his pitch was to get as many people to the conference as possible. Any good Conference Chair would do the same. While I share some of the same concerns that both Chaplain Wintz and Dr. LaRocca-Pitts has, namely nomenclature and lack of "front-line" expertise, one of my concerns is that all of the faculty is of one gender - male. In addition, I felt that Dr. Hamdy response to Chaplain Wintz and Dr. LaRocca-Pitts was some what pious by providing instruction to us that we have to "blunt our sensitivities" so that dialogue can happen. Frankly, I felt that Chaplain Wintz and Dr. LaRocca-Pitts were not trying to "blunt our sensitivities" but sharpen sensitivities toward a greater inclusive voice.

I hope to attend this conference, but I admit that I go with a jaundiced ear, it appears that the faculty all have outstanding credentials in research and administration, but I don't know any of that have spent half the night holding a patient's hand, or been with a family who is making the decision to withdrawal "life-support" in hopes of a new life beyond this earthen vessel.

D. James Stapleford, D. Min., MBA
Director of Spiritual Care and Education
Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital
Albany, GA

I find Dr. Hamdy's response statements ring with a tone of superiority that offsets his intentions. It also shows how little he grasps the spiritual realm that chaplains often find themselves. I think the intention of such a conference good but it seeks to establish a top down (physician superiority) mind set instead of an equality focus that can be more productive.

Do you have thoughts about advocacy you’d like to share with your colleagues? Send an e-mail to info@PlainViews.org.

Imagine you are on the first day of your first job right out of college. You walk into a gruesome crime scene. In front of you lie several bodies bloodied from the gun fight that ended just a short while ago. You are given the task of investigating the scene and writing a report all within a few hours.

This is just one scenario a new journalist may face. Reporting the news in a timely manner often means pushing your own emotional reactions to the side.

Throughout my adult life I’ve had the privilege to listen as news journalists relay similar situations they’ve encountered while doing their jobs. Each journalist developed coping skills for handling the violent and traumatic events he or she reported. Some eventually left the field too overwhelmed by the stories they covered.

Many journalists enter the profession out of a desire to help society, to expose an injustice and to improve the human condition. Like first responders to any emergency, journalists must develop coping mechanisms to process their experiences while continuing to do their jobs.

The journalists who write or talk on air about a story have one outlet for the difficult situations they’ve witnessed, but they generally have to develop their own support network. Photojournalists and videographers often do not have the writing outlet. Doing their job properly requires close proximity to the event with only the lens of their camera between the trauma and their eyes. They too must develop their own outlets for processing what they witness.

Chaplains have a tremendous opportunity to be a caring presence to these journalists. Over the past six years I’ve studied the field of news journalism and found a great deal of acceptance and also skepticism among news professionals.

They often appreciate the fact that a non-journalist relates to their particular job stress but are wary of anyone from a faith community they perceive as trying to push a religious agenda.

To learn more about journalists and the particular difficulties they face in the course of their work you can visit these web sites:

Do you have thoughts about education & research you’d like to share with your colleagues? Send an e-mail to info@PlainViews.org.

It’s not Okay
That
You reach an advanced age
Only to feel alone, depressed abandoned, unappreciated and
With no one left and with nothing to look forward to
The rest of your days.

It’s not Okay
That
You lie alone in your hospital room
Broken, healing, uncomfortable, and in pain,
Wondering, “Why me? What did I do to deserve this?”
With no one to be with you, listen to you, and share your
Feelings of helplessness in one of the darkest times of your life.

It’s not Okay
That
You find yourself imprisoned, alone
Anxious, intimidated, in a menacing sea
Feeling deserted by your community, forsaken by God
With no one to visit you, witness your unique being,
Celebrate your essential humanity; share your fears and hopes,
And to hold out the possibility of a life beyond your bars.

It’s not Okay
That
You and your family find yourselves trapped in a relationship
Unloving, abused, victimized, perpetrating, victimizing,
Not knowing how to communicate your feelings, your thoughts
Without someone who will see you for who you truly are a
Child of the same God, who will be there to support you
As you struggle to survive and to seek your way out.

It’s not Okay
That
You find yourself institutionalized in a psychiatric hospital
Forgetting who you are, sometimes for day and weeks,
In a drugged haze, “for your own good.”
Disrespected, managed, and manipulated - as if you were
A helpless fumbling idiot, child, a sub-human nuisance.
Without someone nearby who cares to be by your side as you
Struggle to reclaim your life, your dignity, and your humanity.

It’s not Okay
That
You awake one day in hospice, or alone in your home
In the last days of a life you have just been living
Wondering about the meaning of that life, your life
Angry with yourself, enraged with God,
Angry for living in a pain that just won’t go away.
Without someone to be there, share your suffering and confusion,
To help you re-view the riches of who you are, have been,
Come to Peace, commemorate, and celebrate your living.
Why me?
Because I, too, have felt…
Alone, abandoned, isolated, powerless,
Trapped, victimized, forgetting who I am,
Misunderstood, managed, manipulated,
Disrespected, confused, aching, and in pain.

And if my being with you
Witnessing, sharing your life, feelings
Helps you grow towards wholeness,
In touch with your wonder and awe,
Expanding your capacity to love and to praise God,
Re-knit yourself into the Web of all Life.

Do you have thoughts about spiritual development you’d like to share with your colleagues? Send an e-mail of any length to info@PlainViews.org.

EthicsWalk addresses spiritual care as an ethical enterprise. It explores why relationships between spiritual care providers and those they serve need protection, and examines what that protection entails. PlainViews invites our readers to share their responses to each EthicsWalk column, which will be published in the following issue.

If you’d like to respond to EthicsWalk, please send a comment of no more than 100 words. You can use the e-form below (click on "hearing from you," link) or submit your commentary to the editors in the body of an e-mail (or as a Microsoft Word attachment) sent to Info@PlainViews.org. Please put the phrase “EthicsWalk” in your subject line.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Anne Underwood is on a break for the summer. If there is a particular issue that you would like her to write about this coming fall, please send your ideas to: info@plainviews.org.

We post an ethical or situational concern that has arisen in a facility where one of our readers works. It has no identifiers included. It gives you only the facts of the case. Then, you can respond to that concern. This is an ongoing dialogue, with comments added as they come in. In the following issue, assuming it has been resolved, we give you the outcome from the facility where the incident took place. Please send any cases that you would like considered for inclusion to: info@plainviews.org

We hope that this new addition will help to inform not only those who are dealing with the issue, but will enable all of our readers to learn from the experiences and perhaps mistakes of others.

PLEASE NOTE: Due to unanticipated continuing responses to both the case and the resolution of the case, added responses can be viewed in the archives. Click HERE.

What is the chaplain's pastoral role with the patient? The wife? The other family? The staff? Advocating for the family for the time they need, letting the staff or administration worry about hospital cost. They need time for closure, grief, coming to terms with his state. They also need their own religious resources, such as a rabbi, to be a part of the team. The time spent with family and keeping one’s mind open to family system issues may give some hints of what is needed for closure. You really want to look down the shotgun barrel with them at what is troubling rather than stand in front of it in ANY adversarial way.

What is the chaplain's role in helping to resolve these ethical issues with the wife? The other family? The staff? The wife and/or family may be open to prayer. They may be willing to discuss history of similar events in their lives, for example, with a parent who has died and what that is like. Helping the family hear the medical staff would probably be the best thing you could do for the staff. Helping staff see the need to support their hope to some extent so that trust was rebuilt. Otherwise, it is an untenable situation and is fraught with litigation possibilities

This case involves two cultural issues:

1. The reluctance to disconnect life-support reflects a Jewish urge to preserve life at all costs. Although many rabbis of all denominations have indicated support for disconnecting such systems if a patient is brain-dead, the issue of a permanent vegetative state is not as clear. Moreover, even if the family is not religious, the wife may be ambivalent about saying goodbye. I have often found such ambiguity among Jews, even those whose loved ones have given advance directives about their care.

2. The emotional response of the patient's wife is typical of European Jewish immigrants. If the woman's primary language is still Russian or Yiddish, this may be her way of expressing her grief. As presented, I don't think she is a suicide risk. There may be unresolved issues which she needs to address before she can say good-bye to her husband.

The chaplain's role is two-fold: First, honor the wife's feelings. Second, over time explain the futility of keeping the patient on life-support. It may be helpful to consult with the family's rabbi, and to ask for his/her intervention. Over time, the family will determine what's in the patient's best interests, and what is in theirs. This might include moving the patient to a skilled nursing facility or removal of life-support. In addition, the chaplain should explain the cultural and religious issues to the staff so they can respect them.

Finally, if the wife is receptive to the ministry of presence, the chaplain should continue to play that roll. It may eventually provide an opening for her to talk about her feelings in this difficult situation.

Rabbi Jim Michaels
Director of Pastoral Care
Ethics Committee staff liaison
Hebrew Home of Greater Washington

Several things came to mind in the initial reading of this case:

-The importance of advanced directives.
-Education to the community, churches, and senior housing facilities about the importance of having “the conversation”with your loved one about your wishes.
The fact that shock and denial are key players in the wife’s grief and that seems to be where she is at the moment. It’s important to address those stages and acknowledge them.
-Would the patient want to live this way even if there was the remote possibility of limited recovery?
- Are there unresolved issues within the family that need to be addressed?
- Is the family at a loss as to how to “say goodbye”to a loved one?

Since I am a hospice chaplain, has the hospital facility utilized the local hospice to offer the family support and counsel, even if the patient is not admitted to hospice care?

Rev. Amy Jo Jones, BM, MM, MDiv., BCC
Chaplain/Grief Support Center Coordinator
Big Sky Hospice
Billings, MT

The role of the chaplain is quite frequently, if not always, to help meaning come forward. How I can see this unfolding in this particular case is to help the wife speak to what it means for her to experience her husband in this condition. What the present is like for her. Something as simple as "I don't know what it's like for you" may be the invitation to companionship that this woman needs. Likewise, the "miracle" piece seems to be dangling out there unaddressed. What would a miracle look like? What does a miracle mean to her.

On the ethical side is a huge issue of patient driven care. It seems like all decisions are being made on the basis of what the wife wants, while there is no place for the voice of the patient. Did he have any advanced directives? Were there any conversations between the spouses when he was otherwise healthy? What gave his life meaning? What are the chances of him recovering to a meaningful life experience? Based on the description the patient has suffered a pretty devastating anoxic brain injury which "killed" the husband that the wife knew-but does she know this, does she understand? Even if it weren't for the anoxic injury, he seems to have been close to futility anyway.

It doesnt seems like an effective course to try to convince the wife of anything. It seems like a more helpful frame, from the perspective of Spiritual Care as well as the rest of the Healthcare team would be to talk about meaning-both what it means for her to experience this and what gave his life meaning.

Andrew Schoenfield, M.Div.
Priest-Chaplain
Archdiocese of Seattle
Department of Spiritual Care, UW Medicine
Harborview Medical Center

Mr. M is a 65-year old male of Russian Jewish ancestry who immigrated to the US after the SEcond World War. End-stage renal disease placed him on dialysis. Recently he made the decision to go on the kidney transplant list. In early March 2006 he suffered chest pains. A cardiac cauterization was scheduled. The results of this procedure showed cardiac by-pass surgery was necessary. The following day a quadruple cardiac by-pass was performed.

Mr. M survived surgery, however he had great difficulty being removed form the ventilator. Once weaned from the ventilator he had a cardiac arrest. He was anoxic for a prolonged period of time.

Multiple complications followed the arrest: various infections, septic wounds, and decubetus, repeated replacement of central lines and feeding tubes and dialysis problems.

EEG’s have determined limited brain activity; but is not considered brain dead.

More accurately Mr. M can be described as existing in a permanent vegetative state - PVS. He remains a full code. He was recently transferred from the Coronary Acute Care Unit to an Advanced Ventilator Step Down Unit. His wife refuses to accept a Skilled Nursing Facility placement.

His wife and brother keep a vigil at his bedside during visiting hours believing he will come back to a fullness of health. They seek a miracle.

The family will not listen to the medical staff as they attempt to address the issue of withdrawal of life support.

The patient’s wife who is by training a dentist, calls to him at all times “wake up –come back –do not leave me.”She has repeatedly stated that she would kill herself if he should die, as she has “nothing.”

She refused to accept anything other than the ministry of presence. When Psychiatry sought to intervene, she physically ejected the doctor from the unit. She speaks only of her love for her husband. She feels the hospital is not treating him aggressively enough.

What is the chaplain's pastoral role with the patient? The wife? The other family? The staff?

What is the chaplain's role in helping to resolve these ethical issues with the wife? The other family? The staff?

Please check the archives below for comments made about the last CaseConference.

Revered Jainist monk Gurudey Shri Chitrubhano leads eighteen young Americans to India in this documentary to explore the magnificent architecture and carvings in ancient Jain temples and to receive a deeper understanding of Jain philosophy.

The film’s journey includes a ritual climb up Mount Palitana to stunning views of the 700 temples at its peak, which are among the seven wonders of India.

According to Gurudey, to achieve enlightenment one must conquer the enemies within through meditation, revere all living things and commit to non-violence. The approximately six million current followers of Jainism strive to follow the cardinal religious principles of non-violence, tolerance of a multiplicity of views and non-possessiveness. Those principles are as relevant today as in the 1970s, when Elda Hartley and her crew were among the first Westerners to film these Jainist temples.

Though Jainism came into being around the same time as Buddhism, some 2,500 years ago, Jain monks were not allowed to travel and the movement remained more localized. Chaplains will find this “do-it-yourself”religion relevant to the culture of independence in our American society. As the monks say: “Follow certain precepts of non-violence, reverence for life and meditation, and you can find your own enlightenment in your own way and in your own time.”

If you are interested in purchasing this film, you can do so at www.hartleyfoundation.org. Just click on “Hartley Classics”on the homepage for more information. The cost of the film series is $19.95 for a VHS.

Sarah Masters is the Managing Director of the Hartley Film Foundation, a non-profit foundation dedicated to cultivation, support, production and distribution of the best documentaries and audio meditations on world religions, spirituality, ethics and well-being.

Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
and
Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith

Essayist and novelist Anne Lamott is a committed Christian woman, living in California, with a history of impermanent relationships and drug addiction; she is a recovering alcoholic. She is 50-something, politically fairly liberal, and a single mother. Given that description, one might wonder what she can say to someone who is a committed Jew, living in the Rocky Mountain West, a chaplain and rabbi, without a history of substance abuse and alcoholism, is 60-something, less liberal politically, married with children, and a grandfather. The answer is that she can say a great deal.

Anne Lamott’s recent books, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith (1999) and Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith (2005) look at life with its challenges and frustrations, its pain and suffering, its many messy moments filled with clutter, and she can turn the mundane into gems of light. Her writing is insightful, incisive, and filled with wonderfully effective self-deprecating humor. A warning to the reader: her writing is subversive. There are many lessons beneath the actual text.

In the earlier book, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith, with surprising candor and great wit, she writes of much of her troubled history, and her spiritual search. Yet even within those pages, sometimes filled with angst, her humor shines through. In a chapter dealing with a cancer scare she explains that she finally got herself to write a note to God on a scrap of paper. It said, “I am a little anxious. Help me remember that you are with me even now. I am going to take my sticky fingers off the control panel until I hear from you.”(180) In another section she speaks to all of us –including many of those with whom we as chaplains interact every day –who are way past 30-something. She writes, “I am trying to accept that I am actually m-m-m-m-m-middle-aged. And even though I am a feminist and even though I am religious, I secretly believe . . . that I am my skin, my hair, and worst of all, those triangles of fat that pooch at the top of my thighs. In other words, I am my packaging. Even though both feminism and Christianity have taught me that I am my spirit, my heart . . . I know you have bigger fish to fry, I said to God, but I need a little help with this stupidity.”(172)

In Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith we learn that her son Sam is now a teenager, and so she offers this advice about childrearing: “Breathe, Pray, Be Kind, Stop Grabbing.”(94) A wonderful storyteller, in the chapter titled “Holy of Holies 101”Lamott relates a Hasidic tale of a “rabbi who always told his people that if they studied the Torah, it would put Scripture on their hearts. One of them asked, 'Why on our hearts, not in them?’The rabbi answered, ‘Only God can put Scripture inside. But reading the sacred text can put it on your hearts, and then when your hearts break, the holy words will fall inside.’”(73)

Lamott explains that, as I suspect for many, she tries “to listen for God’s voice inside me, but my sense of discernment tends to be ever so muddled.”(21)

In the earlier book, she wrote, “God: I wish you could have some permanence, a guarantee or two, the unconditional love we all long for. ‘It would be such a skin off your nose?’I demand of God. I never get an answer. But in the meantime I have learned that most of the time, all you have is the moment, and the imperfect love of people.”(168) She returns to this theme in the latter volume when she relates a meeting with the founder of the “Church of 80% Sincerity.”There, “everyone has come to understand that unconditional love is a reality, but with a shelf life of about eight to ten seconds. Instead of beating yourself up because you feel it only fleetingly, you should savor those moments when it appears . . . ‘We might say to our beloved, “Honey, I’ve been having these feelings of unconditional love for you for the last eight to ten seconds.”Or “Darling, I’ll love you to till the very end of dinner.”’”(110)

For chaplains who know something about stress, suffering, and the need for emotional absolution, she reminds us that “families are definitely the training ground for forgiveness. At some point you pardon the people in your family for being stuck together in all their weirdness, and when you can do that, you learn to pardon anyone. Even yourself, eventually”(Traveling Mercies, 219-220).

These books are quick reading, pungent, thoughtful, and while she frames her thoughts within a Christian experience, generally with very little effort the reader or the chaplain-reader can universalize their message and apply it to one’s own life. If you do not yet know her writings, they probably will become part of the materials that address your reading in the area of personal spirituality.

Anne Lamott, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith (New York: Pantheon/Random House, 1999), 275 pp.; Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith (New York: Riverhead/Penguin 2005) 320 pp.

Do you have thoughts about these reviews you’d like to share with your colleagues? Send an e-mail to info@PlainViews.org