Decency

I don’t believe in final rites - words that must be spoken by priests or other religious leaders in order to help someone secure a place in heaven. But I do believe in decency.

Earlier this year, the largest hospital in my area chose to do away with the positions of paid on-call priests and pastors.  Some have graciously chosen to stay on - on a volunteer basis.  You may say that it ought to be volunteer work in the first place, but the position includes subjecting yourself to the job of being woken or pulled away at all hours in order to council physically and emotionally hurt  or possibly dying strangers.  If some chose not to stay on as volunteers, to retire instead, this sounds very human and reasonable to me.  It is not a job I would envy.

However, someone died today. We knew it was going to happen, but as one of the nurses said “she’s not ready to go, the priest hasn’t arrived yet.”  She hung on for a half hour longer than some thought she would, and the medical secretary tried and tried to make sure a volunteer priest would make it on time. But they didn’t make it.  She died, waiting. She died, probably filled with anxiety that she would have to die before the priest arrived, and guess what? Her last worst fear came true.

This is unjust, this is unkind, and this is indecent.

And if I am able to bring this before anyone who will listen to me, I will also add that this is terrible for the name of our hospital.  Family was there, aware that she had asked for a priest that we did not provide.  This is every bit as important as other functions of a hospital, because in the end it all boils down to the experience the patient is provided with - be that in their medical care, or whether or not the nurses came back with water they promised, or whether or not the patient was able to receive their  last rites before being rolled away in a blue-draped box. Patients don’t come back from the morgue, we don’t get a redo.

Of course, this goes beyond last rites for me, because they took away the pastors as well.  The men who, if on call, would arrive and share Truth with trauma victims and men and women who would soon meet the eternity they’ve come so close to.  This is something I cannot give up without a fight.

In a state where drug addiction is an epidemic, and in a country where hate crimes make the weekly news with almost predictable constancy, the last thing we need as a people is to have less men and women promoting peace and giving comfort amidst tragedy.

Perhaps nothing will ever come of this, but my blood cries out at injustice and it runs hot with the passion to right wrongs. And if this patient’s terrible, unfortunate passing can serve some sort of purpose, I will try to be sure that it does.

Because it’s the only decent thing to do.