Journal of Sacred Work

Today’s meditation was written by Cathy Self, Senior Vice-President for the Baptist Healing Trust.

     The words of St. Francis of Assisi hang as a touchpad at my door’s entrance: pax et buonum – peace and all good. These are the words St. Francis of Assisi is said to have used in leave taking whether in writing or in person. His words of blessing came to mind recently as I toured Alive Hospice here in Nashville earlier this week. This is a place renowned for radically loving those who enter its doors. It is a place of peace and all good. Walking through the hallways of the hospice residence, the quiet and almost invisible presence of the caregivers there reached me in deep and almost forgotten places. How many hundreds of hours of silent and unacknowledged care have the hands of these caregivers provided? Countless days of tender care, competent skill, loving hearts, and soft hands have been offered over and over to those who may not see or hear or even feel the gifts being provided, all without fanfare or formal recognition in the moment of the giving.

     The unsung heroes among us are legion. The greatest among us are those who make themselves the least of all – moving quietly and almost invisibly in their work. They are the healers, even as life transitions into what we call death. A nurse in Texas wrote about those who Love with a servant’s heart:

Not a word in honor of the long-term companion,/ Of the one who kept track of the pills, sat up nights,/ Fixed the eggs if eggs were what he promised he would eat. /Ignored in life and hidden in death; the hypocrisy must burn your soul.

But I know who you are and what you did and who you were to him. /You did not bear his children./ You did not dance with him at the prom./ But you escorted him through his last breath; you opened the door/ and granted him permission to leave when everyone else insisted he stay.

You may not have been the love of his life. / More important, you were the love of his death.*

     The rich gifts of a thank you or smile from those for whom we care are treasures. We are, after all, human, and words of gratitude are like treasure on earth. But for those whose work is among the tiniest or the frailest or who simply cannot respond, may our words to you be words of Love – thank you, peace, and all good.

*("Long-Term Companion", by Jessica Shrader, Wylie Texas. From the book Intensive Care. More Poetry and Prose by Nurses)