2005 Evangelization Supplement
Hospital chaplains provide ministry of presence
By Mary Ann Wyand
Hospital chaplains work alongside the greatest healer of all time to evangelize by providing a “ministry of presence” for patients, their relatives and even medical staff members involved in crisis situations.
In this way, chaplains offer spiritual support to people facing illness or death as well as comfort grief-stricken families regardless of their faith tradition. They also assist physicians, nurses and other hospital associates who work in life and death situations every day.
St. Thomas Aquinas parishioner Sharon Mason of Indianapolis, a staff chaplain at St. Vincent Hospital in Indianapolis for 18 years who has a doctorate in ministry, and Father John Mannion, director of spiritual care for the St. Francis Hospitals in Beech Grove, Indianapolis and Mooresville for 17 years, said providing spiritual care in the hospital setting is a 24/7 ministry because chaplains respond to the needs of patients, families and employees as representatives of Christ.
“It is a ministry of presence,” Mason said. “For me, when you read the Bible, the promise of God is ‘I will be with you always.’ … In some ways, what I think we’re called to do is make tangible that promise of God. We stand in that place of deep pain and deep sorrow with families and meet them where they are.”
She always wears a cross and believes this nonverbal way of communicating God’s presence to people helps them immediately understand that they are not alone in their grief.
Mason is assigned to St. Vincent’s emergency room, neonatal intensive care unit and high-risk labor unit so she encounters people struggling with crisis situations every day.
Simply introducing herself as a chaplain helps patients and family members accept her presence in the hospital room, she said, and invites them to look to her as a source of support and comfort.
“There aren’t any magic words when people are losing a child or losing a grandparent or whatever the situation is,” Mason said, “but, for me, part of what the ministry is all about is helping those folks to recognize the strength of their own faith, their own faith tradition and the presence of God.
“So often, it seems to me, particularly with young families who are losing a baby, there is the sense of abandonment, the feeling that God is not there,” she said. “I try to help people see and look for God … in the words, in the presence [and] in the touch of people who give them comfort in the midst of the pain because the pain isn’t going to go away. They have to go through it, but the thing is that they don’t have to go through it alone and never, in fact, do go through it alone whether or not they can recognize the presence of God. I try to help them see that presence.”
Father Mannion said spiritual care is an integral part of the whole cycle of the patient’s care, which encompasses the body, mind and spirit, at St. Francis Hospital.
“All [hospital] chaplains are trained to be ‘present’ to the patient,” he said. “They are not to set the agenda, but to see the patient as the teacher and [themselves] as the pupil. In their extensive training, that is constantly brought to their attention. Many times, it is taking a journey with the patient, and a part of that journey is listening. … They must be open to how social conditions can affect people’s lives as well as the dynamics that their environment plays in the whole process.
“Chaplains are not ‘God people’ as much as sojourners on the road,” Father Mannion said. “They are listeners on the road to Emmaus” who respect people’s spiritual beliefs and faith tradition as well as their lack of beliefs.
“Our constant focus is on Christ’s healing ministry,” he said, “and not whether you are saved, forgiven or salvation is at hand. Healing is much more inclusive.”
The Franciscan mission is integral to the ministry of St. Francis Hospital’s 4,000 employees, Father Mannion said. “Respect for life, fidelity to our mission, compassionate concern, joyful service and Christian stewardship … I feel all the chaplains help in many ways to instill and strengthen those values in our employees. Spiritual care here is a very integral part of the life of the institution. All the chaplains work very closely with the entire staff, and they are well-loved and respected.”
St. Francis Hospital chaplains represent almost all the faith traditions, he said. “I love the multiplicity of ministries and the many faces of a living God and how that presence is perceived and carried out. An incarnate God is in the faces of people of all backgrounds, and when you can take that reality and see it carried out daily it becomes real. In my many years here, only once have we ever had a patient ask specifically for a chaplain of another denomination. Doesn’t that say volumes?”
With sickness comes brokenness, Father Mannion said, but healing comes when a chaplain stands or sits beside a patient’s bed and simply listens to their story, fears and needs.
“That is our job,” he said, “because it comes from a Spirit that reminds all of us [of God].”
Miracles happen daily in hospitals, Mason noted, but people also die there every day.
Hospital chaplains function as a “lifeline” for the patient and relatives, she said, especially in the emergency room setting where they serve as a liaison between the medical staff and the family.
“In the emergency room, I wait at the front desk for the family and take them to the consultation room,” Mason said, “so I’m the first person to make that connection with them. … First of all, what I’m doing is providing a sense of safety and security in the midst of what is already chaos for them because they don’t know what has happened to their loved one. I tell them, ‘Let’s go back and let the doctor tell you what’s going on.’ ”
People need to grieve in their own ways, she said. One of her favorite Scripture passages is Isaiah 43:1-4, which reassures people that God has called them by name and is with them in their times of pain and sorrow.
She said most families, even those who do not profess any religious belief, accept her offer to pray with them.
As a representative of the hospital, Mason works with clergy from all faith traditions and often finds that the pastor and family members want her to help them with hospital-related needs, questions about organ donation or information about contacting a funeral home.
When a patient dies, she said, family members want to know if their loved one is OK.
“I first ask God for blessing and reception of the person who has died,” Mason said, “then ask blessing for the family and recognition that the next few days are going to be very difficult for them, and that, ‘Even as you enfold this person in your love, let this family also be aware of your love, and may they offer that love to one another as they go through this time of grief.’ ”
Each day, hospital chaplains consult an updated list of patients in need, she said, but are not always able to be present to all of them.
“That’s another part of my daily prayers,” Mason said, “that I will be drawn to those who are most in need today. My faith is that God will give them what they need.”
Evangelization in the hospital setting also involves educating staff members, she said, about ways to help people understand how God is present for them.
At St. Vincent Hospital, that includes the teachings of St. Vincent de Paul, which focus on how the love and charity of Christ inspires the faithful to help people in need.
“I think that’s true not just about the hospital chaplains, but also about all the people who work here,” Mason said. “The underlying principle of the hospital really is that the charity of Christ is what moves us to do what we do and gives us the strength to do what we do for others.” †
