In my wild ride of Seminary, there was a summer where I spent my time as an intern Chaplain at Atlanta Medical Center. Many times when people would see me roaming the halls they would assume they were near death. AH! It's the CHAPLAIN!!! RUN!!! I'M ABOUT TO DIE!! This would even be when I would meet people on regular floors to just see if they wanted prayer or just to talk. Hollywood portrays the religious figures for death, weddings, and strange supernatural experiences. Why does it seem that we ignore our faiths until the alarm bells sounds? Or why is it when we are speaking to the porcelain goddess in deep regret for a wild night that we send our prayers to God asking for quick relief. What happens to our relationships with the triune God when we are on an ordinary day? Do we find ourselves disconnected, or fitting in a quick prayer with our endless mounting tasks? How differently may we cope during a crisis if we spend some time in gratitude for the grace given to us on an ordinary day? How differently would we live our lives if we spent some time contemplating the impermanence of it?
I wonder if we as ministers might add to this attitude. If 85% of the time we come around is during those alarm bell moments, it's not surprising the other 15% is misinterpreted.
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Kym Whiteside
12/10/2013 06:47:01 am
I struggle with this myself. Not so much with the prayer, but with just spending time with God. We seem to live in a culture that doesn't encourage alone time, and so I think that translates into an imbalance with our relationship with God. What do you think the church can do to help us understand how to build that relationship with God.
This post make me think of that old quotation, "Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee." I wonder if the alarms and sirens are our day's version of the funeral bells of which that preacher/poet wrote.
Perhaps we have lost some sense of interconnectedness, of sharing in the sorrow of others. A chaplain, therfore, whose calling is to embody that shared lament, becomes a personal harbinger rather than a communal witness.
Perhaps the way to nuture our faith when we are not in times of crisis is to pay attention to the crises around us, to connect with the alarm bells instead of dismissing them as "someone-else's-problem."
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Carol Marie Underwood has a Masters in Divinity and Masters of Arts in Practical Theology and loves to integrate this with her love of Science Fiction.