The Celebration of The End of Earthly Life

In my retirement I work part-time as a hospital chaplain. The company I work for, Community Chaplain Services, Inc., provides ministry to small hospitals that typically would not have a chaplain on staff. I service four long-term acute care hospitals and one rehabilitation hospital. That sounds like a lot but in actuality I visit them all once a week and then am on call the rest of the time.

One such phone call came before dinner the other night. A family at one of the hospitals I service in Dallas was requesting a visit. They had made the decision to remove a man from life support. I quickly ate dinner and then headed into the city. On arrival I checked with the nurses station and got an update on the patient's condition. As is typical in such situation, the man had a number of serious health issues including kidney failure and congestive heart failure. He had been fighting pneumonia and now had a secondary infection that would allow him to swallow. The family had opted to remove him from the ventilator rather than insert a feeding tube that would prolong his suffering. Once life support was removed the hospital would shift in a comfort mode, allowing nature to take it's course.

As I turned the corner and headed down the hall leading to the room I noted a group of at least eight people, including three children, standing outside the room. It's rare to find more than a half dozen or so adults huddled around a bed in those circumstance. The presence of elementary age children was a first for me. When I entered the room I found it filled with at least a dozen more adults, one of whom was holding an infant. Next to the bed, holding the hand of the patient, was smiling black woman who was obviously the wife. The atmosphere was quiet and respectful but hardly tense and definitely not somber. There were more smiles than frowns and definitely no tears.

In such situation I want to get to know as much as I can about the patient prior to praying with the family. Such a discussion is not only helpful for me but also a catharsis for the family. "He was my blind date," the wife began. "I didn't like him at first because he said he drank beer. My mother had told me alcohol was a sin. I vowed not to see him again until he sent me a note asking for a second chance." They had been married thirty-seven years. "He was a cook for Southwest Airlines," she responded when I asked about his career. "Southwest Airlines?" I questioned, knowing the low-cost carrier doesn't serve on-board meals. "Yes, he worked in the cafeteria in the corporate offices adjacent to Love Field," she responded. Joe must have been quite a chef because Herb Kelliher, the founder of the airline, had hired him to prepare the food in his home whenever he was hosting an event. He was a man of faith to, worshipping at one of the large black churches in South Dallas. As the stories were told, the children in the crowd listen respectfully. To them he was just grandpa. "He loved to play checkers with me," one noted quietly.

I finally had them gather in a circle around the bed. The chain of loved ones snaked around the room. We joined hands and I read to them from John 14, "Do not let your hearts be troubled... I go to prepare a place for you..." Heads nodded. Then we prayed. There were quiet sentiments, "amen" and "thank you, Jesus." I sensed God's presence. "Where would we be without Jesus?" I thought. We are always Easter People!

Why was I surprised at the presence of Children at such a time? They belonged there. This was their beloved grandfather and they needed to mourn and grieve just like the adults. For Christians, death is just the final right of passage. We celebrate other such events, graduations and marriages, as extended family. Why not death? What better way to celebrate the hope we share as the family of God.

Winning But at What Cost

The Convenant School of Dallas has been in the national news over the last week. Their varsity girls basketball team defeated the team from Dallas Academy, a school for kids with learning differences, by the score of 100 - 0. Coaches and administrators from the losing school report that the girls from Covenant kept full-court pressure on even in the fourth quarter. The Dallas Academy players took only seven shots during the entire game. In the backlash Micah Grimes, the coach from Covenant, was fired. The school offered an apology on their website. Grimes' published comment was he disagreed. "We played the game as it was meant to be played and would not intentionally run up the score on any opponent."

While I don't know Micah Grimes, I am familiar with The Covenant School. They are in the same area of Dallas where Lutheran High School, where I formerly coached and served as school counselor, is located. Covenant has an excellent academic reputation. During my years at Dallas Lutheran we annually played Covenant as part of our non-district schedule. All my contact with them was positive. Covenant was founded on Christian principles and my experience with them reinforced that. So the question is; what went wrong.

Micah Grimes was hired by Covenant to coach basketball. He is not a member of the faculty or staff at Covenant School. He was brought in by the school to build a program, which to his credit he did. The Covenant girls won only two games during his first season. Last year, in his third season, they were state championship contenders. This year they are undefeated in district play.

My observation is that The Covenant School fell into the trap many parents fall victim to. They wanted someone to coach their girls how to play basketball but in the process they exposed the girls, and the school itself, to someone who held a different set of values than they did.

Coaches should be mentors. In addition to teaching athletic skills they need to be imparting life skills as well. Coaches, along teachers, with church youth leaders, scout leaders and others who are paid or volunteer to work with kids, should be part of the parent's support system. They should reinforce and augment that which parents have taught. When they don't, their presence can be counter productive. My only question is why did it take so long for the school administration to discover this? I guess winning covers a multitude of sins.

Snow Days

Yes, we do have winter in Texas. This is one of those days. More often we have ice than snow and that is the case today. It started raining yesterday afternoon and still is drizzling this morning. The temperature are droping and they expect the rain to turn to ice by noon. Some schools have already cancelled. I recall such days when our kids were growing up. We tried to make them fun. There was a sense of adventure on those days and we huddled up inside.

I remember one such day in particular. Our oldest son Peter decided to use the day to work on his science fair project. He wanted to test various drink products to discover the percentage of actual fruit juice they contained. He had containers of everything from orange juice to Orange Crush all over the kitchen table. We all had fun sampling and listening to his comments as he discovered that some of the products he thought were healthy were nothing but sugar, artificial flavoring and food coloring. It was definitely his project and other than tasting and waiting to see if he would clean up his mess, Barb and I stayed out of his way.

That's the way we wanted it. At various times I had been called on to judge science fair projects at our parish school. Come to think of it that's pretty funny since I failed high school biology the first time around. When viewing the project bearing the names of students, it never ceased to amaze me the level of complexity. In some cases we automatically eliminated projects with the comment, "No way a kid did this."

One mistake parents make is to live their lives vicariously through their kids. We normally associate this with athletics and the arts but it can touch other areas, like science, as well. As parents we need to put our dreams and needs to see our kids successful aside and let them be kids. That means learning and discovering things on their own.

Parents Need Permission to Say No?

The Metro Section of the Dallas Morning News printed an article last week on a meeting for parents sponsored by the Highland Park School District. Highland Park, is one of the most affluent communities in DFW, perhaps in the whole country. The school district had invited a Harvard University professor and child psychologist, Dan Kindlon, to offer tips to parents on how to avoid spoiling their children. The author stated that parents arrived in SUV's and sporting expensive manicures and jewelry. My initial response was, "Since when do parents need permission to say no to their kids." One of the first mistakes that parents make is not saying "no" early and often enough. This is not something that is limited to affluent communities. I live in a middle class suburb of Dallas. On an almost daily basis I see parents bend to the will of their children. The child begs, whines and pleads for a candy bar or can of soda displayed temptingly next to the check out line at Kroger. 95% of the time the parent gives in. We are a society that has indulged itself to the point that many parts of the world view us with disdain. Saying "no" is something that God expects, even requires us to do. Parents need to take a stand with their children but kids, especially teens, need to hold their parents accountable for saying "no" to self indulence as well.

The Family at Worship

Our church hosted a concert by singer Peder Eide last evening. He does a program called Taste of Worship. It was geared for families, they were even encouraged to sit together and interact during the concert. The purpose of the program was to extend the worship experience into the life of the family. He offered some great ideas that families could use immediately. One of them was to join hands when you pray in the worship service and to extend that when you pray at home. At another point he had the kids place their hands on their parents shoulders and pray for them. Powerful stuff. It emphasized for me how important touch is in our lives. I am a hugger. Our kids are all huggers. We always greet each other with a hug and then do the same thing when saying goodbye. I know we are a culture that discourages touch. That's flat out wrong for families. Our kids crave our touch. And while your in the middle that embrace why don't you whisper the words they really want to hear, "I love you."

The Heritage of Baseball

I just got back from spending the morning at The Texas Rangers Ballpark in Arlington. I met my son and two oldest grandsons. It was cold, not above forty degrees this morning, but nobody seemed to mind. I guess we're all ready for some baseball. Andrew and Caleb sat in the dugout and ran the bases. Caleb was best at sliding, he even did it in between bases. We saw Josh Hamilton and Ian Kinsler, two of their heroes. What a blessing baseball is! It's great to be able to pass on that tradition to my sons and now my grandsons. We all need to celebrate those things that are special to us with those we love. It is part of what keeps us grounded as families.