Prayer for the Angry

Dear Accidental Intercessors:

Many years ago, while new to my role as chaplain, one of my patients treated my first visit to his hospital room as an opportunity to vent every hostile feeling he harbored against religion, the church and God. Although we had just met, I found myself becoming defensive. I wanted to explain that I was not like those other religious folk who had disappointed, even injured, him; but he left little room for me to voice my protestations. Following such a drubbing, my first inclination was to skip his room the next time I performed my rounds, but after a long conversation with my supervisor I was compelled to try again. “Clearly he needed to talk to you,” my supervisor Fr. Jim Creighton told me. “I mean, look at how much he had to say in response to your just saying ‘hello’.”

Adjusting my ego, I returned to his room for a second visit, and the vitriol continued, complete with a stream of profanity that impressed me (and I had spent several years working with truck drivers). “It’s not about you,” I could hear Jim tell me. “He’s trying to teach you something you don’t want to know about the church, and he won’t be satisfied until he thinks you’ve learned it. Just ask yourself what it is that you don’t understand...and then become his student.”

On my third visit, I began with an apology. “I’m sorry,” I said softly. “You’ve been treated very poorly by people who claimed they were trying to help. They didn’t, they hurt you, that was wrong, and I’m here to say I’m sorry.”

“Well, it wasn’t your fault!” he shot back.

“I know, I wasn’t there,” I continued, “but for some reason I’ve decided to become one of them; and I don’t want to be like them. I’m a student chaplain, and I need to avoid their mistakes or find another line of work.”

“No, no, you keep doing what you’re doing!” He said encouragingly. “I know you’re not all the same, but some of youz guys are real a**h***s.”

The next time I visited, he was getting ready to be discharged. His wife had gone to pull the car around to the front of the hospital, and he was waiting for transport to take him to the exit. He looked up from the wheelchair, and what he said surprised me: “Hey kid, thanks for all the prayers!”

The fact was...I had never prayed with him. I had never offered prayer; I didn’t even say that I would be praying for him when leaving the room on previous visits. But somehow, he concluded that intercessions had been brokered on his behalf, and I was as likely a suspect as he could imagine.

As the transport aide rolled him out, I walked beside him to the elevator. As the doors opened, I wished him well and gave him a wave as he was backed into the car for his descent to discharge. “Don’t be an a**h***,” he shouted as the doors closed between us.

I’d like to think I’ve spent the remainder of my ministry trying to take his advice.

Still learning what prayer can look like, I remain,

With Love,
Jonathan Krogh
Your Pastor