Chaplaincy: working in paradox

Beyond the 300 hours of clinical work that is expected this summer, there is classroom instruction, individual supervision, peer group work and writing assignments in the form of verbatims and weekly reflections.

The following in my first weekly reflection.

The CPE experience is a multi-layered paradox.

In one sense, it’s about providing spiritual care for a hospital patient that is unconditional and flexible care, geared toward the patient’s needs and desires. At the same time, CPE is a process of opening ourselves to our own learning and using our very individualized human experience as text. It is a training experience to become reflectively analytical and intuitively aware of our limitations, intentions, assumptions and motivation. It is an opportunity to live into our ministerial authority and pastoral role.

And for as much as this relationship is human focused, existing in a human-made environment filled with human-made invention, it is actually a relationship rooted in the spirit world. In all of the situations facing a chaplain and the people we serve, the ultimate question is “Where is God in all this?”

Finding God at a time of crisis and in the midst of suffering and pain, offers another layer of paradox. This paradox forms itself in the question of theodicy or how evil and suffering exist in the realm of a benevolent and omnipresent God.

Not surprisingly, while the situations facing the chaplain are often complex and intense, what is often called for is relatively simple: deep listening and knowing and trusting ourselves.

Of course, deep listening is not something that most average Americans are encouraged to do. Our culture revels in the quick comeback and the ability to respond quickly going so far as to cut someone off before they have finished their thought. We often only listen long enough to formulate our response; sometimes we don’t listen at all.

Our culture also seems to encourage quick analysis that has at its root the blame of others. Rather than being reflective about our own contribution to a situation, we stop our thinking by immediately concluding that everything has happened to us and that we had no role in determining the outcome.

However, the chaplain must be able to look at a situation critically; they must be able to understand their own bias and have a firm understanding of their own personal history. Despite our religious upbringing, it is that history that provides our basic theological framework. Additionally, the chaplain must be willing to meet people in weakness and not in mastery of the situation.

The last bit of paradox is that for as much as a chaplain may be firmly centered in self-knowledge, we are attempting to be in a deep relationship with someone who may not be aware of how their own story colors their impressions and their expectations for a religious leader or chaplain.

On first impression, it is in these currents and undercurrents of paradox that we will need to learn to maneuver. With the pastoral care department, its policies and procedures as the boat, and own hearts as a beacon and map, I imagine we’re in for an exciting voyage through a sea of being: theirs and ours.