My day as a Humanist chaplain typically begins when I walk into a room and announce that I’m a volunteer with the pastoral care team checking on people who ticked the ‘no religion’ box. I usually say to a patient, “So I’ve got nothing to sell”. I then ask, “What are you in for?” Some people I meet are anxious. Some are having existential crises. Some are in pain. Almost all welcome my invitation to connect.
At Caulfield Hospital where I work one day a week, as well as just about every other hospital in Melbourne, the religiously unaffiliated comprise the largest cohort of patients. Almost none will ever be visited by a member of the pastoral care team. This continues to strike me as horribly unfair knowing that spiritual care has been found by the World Health Organisation to promote positive physical and mental health outcomes. It’s also unfair because it’s not just patients who are affected by this work.
A couple of months back, I was visiting a man who told me that he would have died a few days earlier if it wasn’t for a visit from a friend. “She saved my life,” he told me. “They said I would have died if she hadn’t brought me in when she did.” A few moments later, he told me, “But you know; I also saved her once.” The man went on to tell me how a few years earlier he had given his spare room to this same woman who at the time was living on and working the streets. “She asked what she needed to do for me to stay at my place. I told her I didn’t want sex or anything else. I just wanted to help her get off drugs.” With tears in his eyes, he told me how this woman, now married with a four year-old daughter regularly comes by to check in on him.
Being able to tell that story allowed this man to make meaning out of a situation that might otherwise have felt meaningless. It also reminded him that he was capable of loving and being loved deeply; something he might not have been prompted to do without our visit. That’s what spiritual care does. It allows a person to remember that they are first and foremost a human being, rather than just a pathology or procedure.
Another story at the hospital that moved me involved a patient I never met. The story was told to me by a fellow pastoral care volunteer during a debriefing session with a couple other volunteers and the coordinator of our program. The volunteer was telling this story because he was troubled by his encounter with this particular patient, which had just ended.
The volunteer told us that the woman he had been seeing, a fifty-something horse breeder who lived in the country, was brought to the hospital as the result of being contacted by her estranged daughter. Her daughter had been battling drugs and was calling to tell her mother that she was finally clean and sober. She asked if her mother might now allow her back into her life. “I was thrilled to get the call,” the patient told the pastoral carer. “I said I’d be there for her whenever she needed me.” The daughter let her mother know that she was moving out of her apartment the end of the week and could really use some help. A day later the mother arrived in Melbourne.
This woman told the pastoral care volunteer that she had never seen a place as filthy as her daughter’s but she didn’t say a word – only cleaned. After falling ill the following day, the woman was admitted to the hospital. Her condition deteriorated to where she learned that she had permanently lost the use of her legs and would forever be incontinent because of a disease she contracted through a cut on her finger while cleaning her daughter’s apartment.
According to the volunteer, this patient never wanted to talk about anything ‘spiritual’ during the weekly visits that took place over ten months. The only thing she felt like talking to him about was Labor politics of the 1970s. But the pastoral carer had been told by the patient’s sister that the woman looked forward to the visits, so much so in fact, that she used to make notes about what topics to bring up.
At our debriefing session, this volunteer acknowledged that after this patient was discharged, he began to feel as though he had “blown the opportunity” to do ‘pastoral’ work for her. He also admitted to never quite understanding why this woman never had anything negative to say about her condition or her daughter, who had eventually moved out of Melbourne and now lived at her mother’s farm. When it came time for group comments, I told the volunteer that he seemed to me like the embodiment of spiritual/pastoral care. He allowed this woman to hold hope for and make her out-of-control life feel a little less that way. And I suggested that perhaps this seemingly ‘no good deed goes unpunished’ kind of tragedy had allowed the patient to find solace in connecting it to having her daughter once again healthy and back in her life. The pastoral carer suddenly looked at this experience through a different lens. Because of this opportunity for reflection, he now saw meaning where he had only seen unjust pain.
That particularly story, along with many other encounters at the hospital, have made me come to appreciate the importance of this work. So much so in fact, that I’m trying to figure out how I might go about making it my day job as well as the work of others, like my Catholic and Anglican counterparts have figured out how to do. For that to happen, we need to be able to ensure that non-religious chaplains not only receive some remuneration but also possess the necessary competencies. Equally as important is providing theology-free pastoral carers with the support and supervision needed to be able to take on work that can be as emotionally challenging as it is rewarding.
If we want to show what Humanism looks like, we have to do more than fight against religious overreach. We need to also demonstrate that the ‘unchurched’ are capable as acting as compassionately as people in faith communities.
Joe completed the two-day course run late last year for a group of humanist volunteers.
Reproduced from Victorian Humanist, Vol. 57, No. 4, May 2018
Copyright © 2018 Joe Sehee
Maybe it’s out there, I haven’t exactly seen it yet – but Joe Sehee here is getting very close to what I would like to see as a choice. The next closest thing is Unitarianians or Quakers, who don’t insist on a particular belief system, but have semi-religious meetings that only insist on respect for others with different views. Part of the trouble is that atheists and other unaffiliated folk, I think, see them as just other religious organizations with rites and creeds that need to be adhered to. The advantages to affiliation with a group are many – noting of life passages, like birth, death, adulthood, parenthood, marriage, “pastors” like Joe who visit you when you need that, social interaction, community betterment, etc. The belief part isn’t, in my view, really necessary – in fact, it gets in the way. So, does anyone know of an organization of “socializing humanists” who meet regularly, with music and song, human interaction, discussions of topics of interest to the community, services of people who know how to minister passage rites and comfort the ailing, and in turn expect respect for fellow community members regardless of their (different, humanistic or religious) beliefs, donations (as able) to further interests of the group, time and some commitment (again, as able)? I used to attend Unitarian services, but when I moved couldn’t get any response on how to continue where no group existed, and I miss it.
There is a tendency to assume that a visit from a particular faith based Pastoral Care team member will have more value then one who is not allied to any faith. In my experience most patients, if not all, are worried, anxious, unsure and feeling very isolated in a strange environment. They want someone to just listen, take away some of their fears and doubts and offer reassurance as necessary. The medical team do not always have the time to meet such patient needs, however, it is recognized that all kinds of human care and compassion improves patient responses and rehabilitation. In my case I avoid any religious discussion but merely try to provide comfort and compassion to anyone in need, regardless of their religion.
Humanists will no doubt play a key role in the spiritual support of our communities into the future. As our population becomes less religious and wants to find real world solutions to their concerns and issues in the real world, the evidence-based, reality-based support of humanist carers will prove to be a real bonus for many people.
And yes, one of the best things we can do is listen to people. Time dedicated to someone to listen to their wants and needs, their desires, their concerns – it shows them that they are valuable as a human being. This is true spiritual care.
Thank you Joe for your story. As a Buddhist spiritual care in acute hospitals i have found that the majority of inpatients, family and staff, want to be heard. Not talk religion. To be able to voice their fears, thoughts, share stories. As you mention, to highlight seeing things through a different lense. With your vast experience in humanity’s ways, you skillfully managed to convey this. Thank you for your relentless pursuit of equality in all areas.
Just back from the Austin hospital. They mention social workers, religious and spiritual care but no-one came to seem me in three days. The social worker was booked for Monday to sort power of attorney but I am home!