After more than three decades of asking at the beginning of
every semester – and often at some point in most lectures and presentations –
“Who defines the terms by which we live?” I have recently been visited with a
down-by-the-waterside revelation: Sometimes the definition has to be asked for.
Part of the work of the messenger/prophet/healer/advocate is to be awake and
aware. That is the simplest and deepest foundation for what our lives must be
devoted to. In one of her most valuable (to me) essays, the wandering
anthropologist Zora Hurston discusses “Conversions and Visions” and describes
how the seeker must be called into the wilderness to receive the vision. And
then the seeker must return to the community and share the vision. Summing up her insight, Hurston says:
The call to preach is altogether
external. The vision seeks the man. Punishment follows if he does not heed the
call, or until he answers.... In conversion, then, we have the cultural pattern
of the person seeking the vision and inducing it by isolation and fasting. In the call to preach we have the involuntary
vision – the call seeking the man.”
(We know that when Zora Neale Hurston was writing this
reflection, the prevailing tradition was to use “man” for all human beings. Her
very life challenged that gender-restrictive imposition of terms. But she was
in good company, then. Nowadays, it needn’t be said....)
In February 2016, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch published a
series of articles, dealing with the health crisis of post-traumatic stress in
children. [ http://graphics.stltoday.com/apps/stress/index.html]
One of the medical
professionals used as a source for these articles was Dr. Kenneth Haller, MD,
an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the St. Louis University Medical
School. Dr. Haller is nationally recognized and respected as a child-care
advocate. In his service, Dr. Haller proves the point that Hurston makes about
someone “seeking a vision” and devoting one’s life to making the vision known.
His preaching occurs every day of his life.
His words in this series of articles filled me up with gratitude that
someone I have known for over 40 years is living up to his calling. And he was called by both the ancestors and
the “beautyful [sic] ones as yet unborn.” I know this. I know him. I know them.
The most recent cloud-clearing burst of awareness came from
listening to one of the true traversers of Jacob’s Ladder, Ms. Ruby Sales.
During a long drive on a Sunday afternoon, I was listening to “On Being” with
Krista Tippett on National Public Radio.
It was obvious that Ms. Tippett’s respect for her guest was enormous.
And then Ruby Sales began to speak. Her credentials as messenger/prophet/healer/advocate
shone bright and cut clean. Now or then, listen to the entire conversation.
Then ask, “What wilderness do I inhabit. And how do I find my way to where I am
being called?”
[Ruby Sales:
“Where Does It Hurt?”/ On Being, with Krista Tippett]
Both Ms. Ruby Sales and Dr. Kenneth Haller ask the same
question. It is the question that no one in public life, few people in
ecclesiastical power, and even fewer people in the academic world ever ask:
“Where does it hurt?”
What must we do to be advocates? Listen. What must we do to
be messengers? Listen. And listen and listen and listen. To discover, as has
been said on this site recently, to the wilderness within our most hidden self.
And they asked Jesus, “Who is our neighbor?”
Our radical transformation begins with telling ourselves that we are
hungry, the naked, the imprisoned, the forgotten, neglected, abused and
forsaken. But that revelation is
thwarted on every front, on every level and inside most hearts – even in the
hearts of those who most loudly declare that they want to “make a difference.”
Then listen.
The life of the woman Krista Tippett calls “a Civil Rights
legend,” was spared for us all when a young man threw his body in front of hers
when protestors were being attacked in Lowndes County, Alabama, when Ruby Sales
was seventeen years old. All of this background can be found elsewhere. What
captures us is the story Ms. Sales tells about sitting down and asking a young
woman, “Where does it hurt?” When I
heard her say that, even the muscles of my imagination took note. Where does it
hurt? How would my life have been
different if someone had asked when I was five or seven, after being abused,
when I was manifesting the pain through the migraine headaches that started
when I was seven: “Where does it hurt?”
What deeper sources of strength would I be able to utilize if after my
being initially rejected for priesthood and doctoral studies, someone would
have said, “Where does it hurt?” and then found the spiritual reserves to
simply listen.
One part of the blessing that flowed from this interview was
my being able to actually see the gift that the abuse, rejection and
diminishment had cultivated in me. I can listen. The advice and counsel may be
effective; but the listening is where the miracle of the Spirit is found.
Which brings me to Dr. Haller.
When I was carried to Omaha in November, 1973, with strict
orders to rest and recuperate for at least six months, I was invited to see a
student production of “A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum” being
presented at Creighton. The play has my special love. Years before, my first lead
role in a play was as the title character in the Roman comedy (“Phormio”) that
is one of the sources for “Forum.”
Besides nothing is more therapeutic than a Broadway musical --just ask
Dr. Haller. He was, I think, a sophomore in the pre-med program at Creighton
University. He played, in my interpretation, the absolutely central character
of Hysterium (played in the original by one of my theatrical heroes, Jack
Guilford). The production was student produced and directed. No faculty were
involved. Faculty and students did not work together in theater at that time. That
struck me as not only odd, but wrong.
Given the nature of Jesuit obedience – and that is not a
given – when I arrived in Omaha my “recuperation” consisted of me already being
named an associate pastor of the university college church. Yes. so much for extended care. Part of my therapy as interpreted by others was an invitation from Fr. Tony Weber to
help him out in one of his theater classes.
I could easily be in “Zoo Story,” he said. For his class. No real stress. Theater is
always restorative. Art. Obedience. Tony Weber. I said yes. Then I was asked to
help with a production being directed by the Speech Department Chair. Finally,
faculty and students were working together; how could I say no? After all, I
was merely recuperating from one of the most devastating and traumatic experiences
of my life. So, I said yes. (Refer to the tradition of “Jesuit obedience,”
please.) And then the Chair of the Speech Department went on a semester-long
sabbatical. Tony Weber then suggested
that, even without a sufficient academic preparation, I could easily (oh, yes;
easily) step in as a substitute for just one semester. No big deal. “You know
enough to keep ahead of the students. It’s just one semester. What could be the
harm?” The Chair never returned. Not. Ever.
Five years later, sixteen productions later; two courses
every semester, and an occasional trip across a local community theater stage,
I left Omaha – after having designed the major in Theater. More trauma. More disappointments. More
betrayals by Jesuits. A lifetime in six
years.
But the students who made the whole enterprise work? There were many, some of whom will read this
entry and wonder why I am singling out only one of the many. And they would be
likely candidates for such remembrance, to be sure. But Ken Haller was one of
the mainstays of our program, our community, my heart. From “Cabaret” to the
infamous “Caucasian Chalk Circle,” he sang, danced and endured. And he was open
and honest and generous and determined. After an internship among the Lakota
people of South Dakota, graduation from medical school and three years of
medical practice for the United States Public Health Service, he called me and said,
“I need to be working where the need is greatest. Any ideas?” That is the Ignatian mission. And putting others
into impossible situations was something I had learned to do quite well, since
it had been done to me for over twenty years by that time.
East St. Louis. Illinois Physician of the Year. Open.
Honest. Tireless. Impatient of petty politics and fear. A friend and healer of
many. “And he grew in wisdom and grace.” While he was in medical school, he did not
perform in any theater events. And while
he eventually found a way to sing in the St. Louis chapter of the Gateway Men’s
Chorus, he was busy being well and doing good. Mourning the death of friends,
being supportive of so many who were drawn to his wit, talent and generosity, he
became the healer he had always aspired to be. In an interview he did as part
of a publicity campaign for Cardinal Glennon Hospital he briefly and with
laser-like clarity describes his whole understanding of “responding to the
vision.”
What pulled me back and forward was this comment: “When I
walk into a room the first time I immediately look for the child...” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXlk5qiJWow
Ah, “I immediately look for the child.” And then he asks, “Where does it hurt?” And
he listens. As has been said before, the most radical act of intervention is to
be able to say, “I see you.” Ruby Sales
knows this. Bob Moses knows this. Sr. Thea Bowman knew it. So did my mother and
grandmothers. “I see you.” I think I can say that much of my own ministry is that simple, also.
What is most beautiful about this one who serves among us is
that he has returned to the stage; has been called one of the treasures in St.
Louis theater. During this season of performances, he is presenting himself and
his journey to becoming a healer. What he learned on the stages of Omaha in the
1970’s he is practicing today: how to be fearless, “on key and in tune” with
his surroundings. And to always be
grateful. One of his best “open mic” nights is presented here. He explains it
well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qgZW51zLS6w
October 31 is his birthday. He listens. He works. He is a
doctor without borders. And he is the son and brother and friend about whom we
should be proud.
