The College of Pastoral Supervision & Psychotherapy is a theologically based covenant community, dedicated to "recovery of the soul" and promoting competency in the clinical pastoral field.
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The Jehovah’s Witness patient was not trying to get me to subscribe to his denomination’s magazine, The Watchtower. Nor trying to convert me to his religion. He was like other Jehovah’s Witness patients, whose humanness shows up once their religion is affirmed with, “May the blessings of Jehovah be upon you.” This Jehovah’s Witness patient told me his story, sharing a message that has implications for any religion.
An 83-year-old black man, in an intensive care unit, suffering a stroke, the patient engaged me as soon as I introduced myself and answered his questions about my chaplaincy and the kinds of patients I visit. “I was a Methodist until 30 years ago,” he began. “I listened to ministers preach from the Bible, and believed what they said. I didn’t know anything different. I was uneducated. I couldn’t even read or write.”
He continued, “Then this Jehovah’s Witness came to my door. He taught me how to read and write. He came to my home every week,” the patient went on. “And he used the Bible, giving me passages to read, which we would go over. It took a long while, but in time I began to read and understand the Bible for myself.”
The patient ended, “You could have written my name on a blackboard, and I wouldn’t have known it. But I know it now. And the man who taught me couldn’t read or write at one time himself.”
Religion is about teaching people how to read and write their own name—and learn for themselves. It is also about the messenger becoming the message.
Chaplaincy is about helping people tell the story of their name.
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Bill Alberts is a hospital chaplain at Boston Medical Center. Dr. Alberts is a nationally known writer and an occasional contributor to Counterpunch. In addition, he is convener of the New England Chapter of CPSP. He can be reached at william.alberts@bmc.org
Posted by Perry Miller, Editor at April 19, 2010 6:35 PM
