From Longing to Belonging

"Blessed be the longing that brought you here and quickens your soul with wonder." - John O'Donohue

I am living in a time of blessing.  The past year has been a whirlwind, so much so that regular writing was squeezed out of my schedule to make room for much change, new experiences, and a lot of hard work.  I spent the last year in a chaplain residency program at the University of Colorado Medical Center (Anschutz Campus) in Aurora.  I was assigned to be chaplain for pre-op and PACU, Surgical Trauma ICU, Surgical Specialties, Internal Medicine, and Transplant units.  In addition, I spent every sixth night at the hospital as the on-call chaplain, sleeping in a tiny room whose simplicity and proximity to other on-call rooms reminded me of a monk cell. On those nights, I was the only chaplain to serve, as need arose, the whole hospital of 600 beds plus the Emergency Department. I worked an average of 45-50 hours/week, and I was emotionally exhausted at the end of each week.  I accompanied people through death, life, and re-birth, and everything in between.  I did this with excellent supervision and accompaniment by the peers in my program.  There were seven of us CPE residents: one of whom exclusively served the addiction-rehab center connected to the hospital and one who was assigned to Palliative Care.

Earlier this summer, I began my first staff chaplain position at a small Catholic hospital in an equally small resort town in the Rocky Mountains.  I am six weeks into the new job, and I love it.  I work an average of 24-30 hours/week, and spend my additional on-call hours at home gardening, biking, walking my dog, playing tennis with the love of my life, and going on small hikes. I am also in the middle of moving my home and belongings from the Denver area.

All this brings me back to my first line: I am living in a time of blessing. I try to be aware of this blessedness and give thanks for it daily.  God knows I have lived in prior times that could not easily be called a time of blessing.  I have been through rough, heart-breaking experiences in which I did not feel at home or thriving in my relationships, work, or community. Perhaps I will write about those heart-breaking experiences one day.  But in this case and in this moment, I feel at home in all three respects: relationships, work, and community.  It is clear to me that all of this is God's gracious gift and an answer to prayer and deep longing.

It seems right that I should give thanks, and tell about it! I hope that my words and actions of love and service will themselves be an expression of my thanks and an extension of blessing to others.  As a patient recovering from a double knee-replacement said to me yesterday: "If we could all just leave the world a tiny bit better than we found it, our lives will have fulfilled our purpose."

Photo taken after first day at my new job in late June 2017.