Human Balm

Yesterday could have been like any other Sunday. I show up for church, adult forum when it happens between the first and second worship, and I try with felt discomfort to step outside myself. In spite of accusations of being such a friendly guy, I am guarded, self-conscious. But yesterday was a little different. We had lots of visitors at St Bede’s, more than the half dozen or so. As I paused at the table outside the church where visitors are greeted and pinned with a light blue ribbon, if they agree to being so designated, and where members with tenure long enough to have a blue name tag are asked to collect and wear their badges of commitment, a visitor shoved her hand forward, “Kathy_____.” I didn’t get her last name.

We talked briefly about the usual, where are you from, what brought you here, here to this melting pot in the high desert. She is a cradle Episcopalian, I with only 38 years in this denomination. She’s been away from church for a good while, and she’s going through a rough patch professionally right now.

I’m a slow learner at times, but I think I’m learning that St. Bede’s will love you, if you really want to be loved. Like most places of worship, it most likely won’t be love at first sight. One of the unfortunate things about church people and people in general is that most of us like to stay inside our comfort zone. And it seems that I’ve heard it enough that I’ve begun to believe that by tradition Episcopalians are a little conflicted when it comes to downright, generous, open-hearted welcoming. To exchange the peace during worship is one thing—to engage genuinely beyond something superficial is another matter. The onus to move from surface is on the shoulders of the person who wants to make such a move.

I should have known that the day would be different somehow when Father Richard, St. Bede’s rector for over10 years now, greeted me with a huge Irish smile and handshake outside the front door, “I’ll be your priest today”. I haven’t a clue as to what brought him outside to the sidewalk on this day. It was enough of a reminder that when I excused myself after talking with Kathy for a few minutes, I did the next right thing, so simple, I asked her to join me in the pews. Later, during the exchange of the peace—“May the peace of the Lord be always with you,” exhorts the celebrant, and we reply “And also with you.”—Kathy thanked me for inviting her to join me during worship.

How miraculous that the simple but genuine gesture of welcome can open hearts and heads. On this day I needed to step outside myself. I needed to let another human being know that her presence was heartfelt by at least one person, one who still considers himself a bit of a stranger in this new land. And I needed to have the conversation that occurred shortly after worship, as many gathered in the common room to celebrate the 13 years of gorgeous music the departing organist had shared with this congregation. I don’t remember how the conversation began with a woman who participates actively in St. Bede’s prayer shawl ministry. Maybe I asked a question after having observed her walk to the front near the close of worship for the shawl she had just completed to be blessed by the priest, the right hands of congregants extended in the gesture of peace as the priest prays.

As we talked about the nature of these shawls, how they are given away (they cannot be bought), who makes them, she related one story of a man whose mother had received a shawl while being treated for a malignant tumor. Don’t worry about cause and effect. The tumor responded to treatment. I asked about learning to crochet so that I might make a shawl, and suddenly I found myself crying, unable to talk, the news so fresh on my heart of my own niece, the first of the grandchildren, who is facing breast cancer, the illness that took her paternal grandmother’s life, during a short span of months that claimed so many people I have loved, including my own Daddy, his two brothers, and both of our grandmothers, who were buried only one week apart.

Yesterday, especially, I needed to step outside myself. I needed to practice the friendliness of which I have been accused. The best way to make a friend is to be a friend, we are advised. And while I don’t use the friend word lightly, I know in my heart that the genuine expression of what we call friendliness carries with it great healing. It is a balm that lives only in the exchange of human kind with humankind. Dogs, cats, horses, name your animal, for all their healing gifts, our reach for one another cannot be equaled.

Human Balm—Santa Fe, New Mexico (June 16, 2009)

R. Harold Hollis