Dame Cicely Saunders is one of the great spiritual benefactors of the modern era. At least that is how I rate the white-haired, kindly looking British physician who, in 1967, began the hospice approach to helping people at the time of their dying.

This quietly dynamic Londoner, now 85, thought it important to move the place where people prepared for death away from hospitals to a home-like setting. She also placed emphasis upon making people comfortable rather than trying to cure them when that was no longer possible.

Thus she brought to the care of the dying not only physicians and nurses but also chaplains and others who could provide for their spiritual needs. She recognized that the soul needed support as much as did the body.

Dr. Saunders has taught people to express five sentiments as they approach death:

1. I forgive you
2. Please forgive me
3. Thank you
4. I love you
5. Good-bye

She herself is a person of great spiritual stature. She once told an interviewer that, rather than dying suddenly, she would prefer to die of cancer. Dying a slow death would give her time to make the statements noted above.

Dr. Saunders draws inspiration from writers both ancient and modern. She finds hope expressed by Julian (or Juliana) of Norwich, a 14th century English mystic who, living at the time of the black plague that ravaged Europe, nevertheless wrote the famous words “all shall be well.”

She also takes inspiration from J. R. R. Tolkien, author of “Lord of the Rings” with its promise of overcoming evil, and from J.K. Rowling who has written the wildly successful Harry Potter series.

Dr. Saunders has brought about a revolution in end-of-life care. Many Americans have found in hospice care crucial support in their time of passage. However 50 percent of those who die each year do so in hospitals despite the desire of the overwhelming majority to be in their own homes when they die.

If all American hospitals offered hospice or palliative care services, then the situation would not be so bad. But, despite the advances in such care, fewer than 60 percent of our hospitals do offer such.

Emily Chandler, a Boston-area resident who is both a nurse and an ordained minister, explains the benefits of the hospice approach as follows: “Experience with hospice has taught us that rather than being a fearful, dreadful experience, dying can be healing, peaceful, even spiritually fulfilling for patients and their loved ones.”

As to what caregivers can do, she writes: “Attuned to the possibilities of sensory spirituality, we can enhance a peaceful, even joyful participation in the encounter with mystery that dying entails. In the process, we can learn something of our own spiritual journeys ourselves.”

The reference to “sensory spirituality” refers to Emily Chandler’s confidence in experiences that engage more than one sense at the same time. As an example, she says that combining sights and sounds or sounds and aromas can be effective in supporting healing memories.

Rev. Chandler also thinks that the great need of people when they come to die is to remember hope. It is a time for them to look back on their lives, if possible, and recall the images they have had of the transcendent, of what goes beyond the seen.

It can help them spiritually to think back to the familiar symbols that put them in touch with God, the beyond, the mystery of life. This is also the time when well-loved stories can be retold with the help of family members, friends, or others in attendance. These tales can stir the heart as they bring back the people and the events that figured large in the person’s life.

In this way, hope remembered can provide comfort and perhaps inspiration at this time of such crucial importance. Dying can thus become an event that summarizes life’s value, making it a supreme human experience.

The approaches to end-of-life care indicated here give expression to a strong movement toward favoring care over cure when the latter is no longer feasible. More and more people in later life want their time of dying to be one in which their bodies are made as comfortable as possible and their souls receive the attention they need.

Richard Griffin

Does a man who was born somewhere around the year 480 have anything to say to modern-day Americans? If that man is Saint Benedict, the answer is yes.

The spirituality taught by this patron saint of Europe speaks to many people nowadays and not all of them are monks. One such person is Lynn Huber, a resident of Colorado, who draws daily nourishment from Benedictine teaching., After growing up in a different religious tradition, this middle-aged woman discovered Christianity and, in recent years, has become an Episcopal priest.

In a talk given a week ago in Chicago, Ms. Huber laid out the major elements of this spirituality, showing how they can enrich the lives of people living in the world.

The small book of rules that Benedict left for his followers provides a framework for a vibrant spiritual life. Chief among his requirements are vows of obedience, stability, and conversion of life, three ways of finding God.

For Lynn Huber and others like her who choose to become affiliated with a monastery without actually becoming a  monk or nun, the spirit behind the vows has meaning. Obedience implies an effort to see yourself as you really are in the sight of God. It means listening to God in the effort to discover a simplicity of life.

For monks, stability means living one’s whole life in the same monastery. Recognizing both the challenges and the blessings of living with the same people for years, Benedict described this setting as “the place of our wounding and the place of our healing.”  

For those living with a spouse or with other people in the world, this changes the basic question from “Am I going to stay” to “How are we going to make it together?”  In other words, one expects to stay with life partners and one concentrates on making it work.

By contrast with those who commit themselves to stability, we Americans tend to be restless and, on average, move every five years. There is not necessarily anything wrong with frequent moves, but it may make personal relationships more difficult.

St. Benedict called the third vow “conversio morum” or a radical change of behavior. In practice this involves the determination to “seek and serve the Lord in all things.”  For lay people outside the monastery that would mean, among other things, the habit of seeing Christ in every person.

The Benedictine way of life is marked by equal attention to work, prayer, study, and leisure. In the current era when so many people seem to have no time for anything but work, this ideal can serve to remind us of the importance of balance in our life. Sometimes, if we want to give God a greater place in our days, we must learn to slow down.

An effective way of approaching this rhythm of life is to take up the practice of another Benedictine spiritual device called “lectio divina”  or sacred reading. Currently many seekers, among them Lynn Huber,  hold this practice in high regard and use it every day.

You do it by taking four steps:

1. Lectio, by which you read out loud and slowly a passage from the Bible or other appropriate text
2. Meditatio, or thinking about it, whereby you let your mind play with whatever strikes you in the reading and pay attention to your feelings about it.
3. Oratio, or praying about it. You talk with God, sharing with God your thoughts, feelings, desires, hopes, and what ever else moves you.
4. Contemplation, or sitting with it. This involves listening to God and waiting on God with your eyes closed, your body still, your mind and heart open.

At her talk last week, Lynn Huber led those present in a lectio divina, using Psalm 23, “The Lord Is My Shepherd.”

Many people who have adopted Lectio Divina do it for 20 minutes, twice a day. But this form of prayer is flexible, ready to be adapted to whatever time you have.

These few features of practices handed down by Saint Benedict may suggest the value of his tradition. The beauty of Benedictine spirituality is its simplicity, its way of making the approach to God attractive and adaptable to use by many different kinds of people.

No wonder that Saint Benedict has long been recognized as one of the great masters of the spiritual life.

Richard Griffin

Mr. Rogers was easy to make fun of. Even a person like me, without a talent for mimicry, could have parodied his words and actions. “Won’t you be my neighbor?” could be made to sound mawkish. And his ritual taking off his jacket and outdoor shoes, then putting on a sweater and sneakers, might have been held up to ridicule.

In fact, comedians on television did sometimes parody Mr. Rogers. However, he was obviously too genuine a person for them to do so with  any ill feeling.

After his recent death, the best thing said of him was that he was just as fine a person off screen as he appeared to be on his program. Apparently, his private personality was identical with the TV persona that reached milllions.

In these times, when public image seems far more powerful than private character, the authenticity of Fred Rogers comes as a morale booster. Unless the nation has been terribly taken in, this man was the real thing.

His spirituality goes far to explain why he was able to maintain his personal qualities throughout a television career that lasted almost 50 years. His custom was to rise before five in the morning and then devote two hours to prayer and spiritual reading. In an interview with Kim Shippey, a Christian Science writer, in 2000, he offered more detail: “I read a chapter from the Old Testament and one from the New Testament, and inspirational works by many other writers.”

But Fred Rogers did not conclude his devotions after his morning session. “All day long I offer prayers of gratitude to God for God’s goodness,” he told Ms. Shippey. “I’ll be driving along and I’ll see something and I’ll just say, ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you.’”

Of course this Presbyterian minister was well schooled in the Bible. In his seminary courses he had received training about the sacred scriptures of the Jewish and Christian faiths. But not everybody who studies scripture makes it an integral part of his or her lifestyle. Fred Rogers internalized it so that the Bible fed his soul each day.  

What always impressed me about Mr. Rogers was the love he manifested toward each child who appeared on his program and each child in his television audience. Making the kid feel good about who he or she was went far beyond mere self-esteem therapy. For Mr. Rogers it was a recognition of the human being as God’s handiwork.

Subtly Fred Rogers was doing his own form of ministry. In the television age he had discovered a new way to extend the Lord’s good news to the children of America. No wonder that the day after he died, the student newspaper at our local  university reported that students were mourning his loss.  

When they were growing up, most of them at least, this television personality had been one of their most familiar teachers and they now missed him. It’s true that most children would outgrow him. At a certain point in their development some would become embarrassed if caught still watching him. But later on they might  recognize the unique contribution he had made to their lives.

That contribution rests on the skillful way he taught them the most important things about life. He was an educator in the classic sense of someone who was committed to inculcating values, rather than just facts. What a contrast he made with the Saturday morning cartoons that were typical television fare for so many children!

One of the values most prominent in his programs was human diversity. By treating everyone with respect, no matter their color or origins, this man taught children and other viewers, whatever their age, that each human being deserves to be treated with respect and love.

Yes, many older people watched “Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood.” Of them, he told his interviewer: “There are those who have said to me, ‘I watched your program on such-and-such a day, and you said exactly what I needed to hear.” And I look back at the videotapes and find that wasn’t what I said at all. I think people hear what they are spiritually ready to hear.”

Others may wish to quarrel with me but I believe Fred Rogers to have been a saint for our times.

Richard Griffin

Following my usual practice, I have reviewed the events of the past week for spiritual meaning. As I survey my calendar, the last few days of February turn out to have been rich in happenings relevant to the life of the spirit.

The full meaning of these events would probably have escaped my notice, however, unless I had taken pains to sift them for what they say to my soul. Like elusive fish, their meanings would have escaped my soul’s net if I had not cast it more widely and deeply.

The first of these events was the funeral of a man whom I did not know well. However, I felt personally connected with him because he was the father of an old friend. When she recounted for me the circumstances of her father’s dying, I felt all the more tied to him.

Bill shared many of my values, including a love of opera. And he did not die that Saturday afternoon until the radio broadcast of the Metropolitan Opera’s production of Don Giovanni, to which he had been listening, had concluded. For a rabid opera fan of many years, what a way to go!

More seriously, he also did not die until the arrival of his other daughter, who had come home from France and reached the hospital only a few minutes before her father’s departure from this world. That was a dramatic arrival, perhaps made possible by Bill’s managing to delay his own death. In any case, it served as a consolation to all the members of his family gathered around.

Seeing the box of his ashes before us gathered at his funeral, I felt touched, as always, by the mystery of it all. Never having lost a childlike wonder at the way people pass from this life, I continue to feel stirred to ask questions. How can the rich complexity of a person’s physical and psychic life be reduced to this small material scope? Despite what lies before us, I believe that ultimately it cannot, but that life will be restored in a new way, difficult to imagine.

The second event that I continue to ponder is an informed account of President Bush’s religious faith. Evan Thomas, a distinguished editor and writer  at Newsweek, told how the president reads the Bible every day. And he prays to God with steady fervor. In fact, Mr. Bush “has a pretty close relationship with his maker,” the editor reported.

The religious component looms large in the president’s hard line against Saddam Hussein. President Bush apparently believes himself called by God to the mission of toppling the Iraqi dictator. He takes it as a duty sanctioned by the Supreme Being to bring down the enemy.

I find this approach of our country’s leader to be deeply problematic and personally troubling. Leaders in my spiritual tradition, from the pope to many other bishops in this country and around the world, constantly brand the proposed war as unjustified. They believe it does not satisfy the basic requirements for a war to be morally valid and warn of its consequences to the people of the world.

A third event of his past week for me was seeing the film “The Pianist.” Marvelously well made by Roman Polanski, this movie presents an agonizing account of the German army’s murderous assault against Polish Jews in World War II. I often found it difficult to watch the brutality of soldiers against the civilian population, one of the many mass atrocities of the 20th century.

This imaginative experience raised for me again the mystery of evil. How can it be that we human beings treat other members of the human family outrageously, simply because of racial, religious, or ethnic differences? And for Christians to mistreat people who share the Jewish heritage of Jesus makes no sense whatsoever.

These three events, all of them raising difficult issues, brought me up close to mystery. The death of one person, the religion-supported decision to wage war, and the horrific portrayal of human degradation and slaughter, has confronted me with the reality of our human situation.

These issues provide much to reflect upon and to pray over. They challenge hopeful attitudes toward the world but can also be seen to underline the value of a deeper spirituality.

Richard Griffin

This long hard winter seems endless. Despite the breaks offered by the arrival of a few relatively warm days, it is hard to believe in the promise of spring.

The skin that covers my hands bursts in protest against days of freezing temperatures, producing small but painful fissures. Even bundled up against the cold I feel the winds going through my winter jacket and I get my feet wet sloshing through puddles.

I feel impatient about putting on heavy clothing every time I leave my house.

But a great blizzard brings with it some redeeming virtues. The new-fallen snow, three feet of it in some drifts, has a beauty about it that is altogether special, at least before the dirt sullies it. People, young and old, walk down plowed streets finding delight in the splendor all around them. Some sporty types convert these passageways into avenues for cross country skiing.

Even the arduous labor of digging out my car becomes a social experience filled with good feeling. Two neighbors come over to help me and take on the task with gusto. Soon we have cleared the snow off the roof and hood, freed the wheels, shoveled out the snow surrounding the vehicle and thrown it to the other side of the street.

Then I am ready to gun the car in the effort to break out to the roadway. It works; I’m in the clear, and the space can be occupied until someone else comes along and takes it when I leave. I resist the impulse to place a barrel there illegally, to save the space against poachers. The area is public, after all; it belongs to the whole community, even if someone else sends me around city blocks searching for another parking space.

I relish conversing with the two neighbors who help me dig. They are decades younger than I, one a fellow writer, the other a high-powered freelance entrepreneur. Gathering together around a common task on a bright, sun-lit morning brings out the good feeling among us. We banter about the storms and about our neighbors, all in a lighthearted spirit infused by the joy of our task.

Where is the spiritual meaning in this experience? Is there anything about the snowstorm and our response to it that goes beyond?

Surely the wonder of it all rates reflection. Nature continues to provide nourishment for us. The water that comes down from the sky in frozen form renews the earth. And the storm presents us with the gift of panoramic beauty, white coating for the landscape.

The coming together of people in response to the snowfall is worth thinking about. I love the community of feeling that results from the shared experience of natural forces. We have something in common that brings us out of our houses and gives us something to talk about together.

The austerity is worth something to the soul. The cold, the inconvenience, the exercise against resistance: all count.

Perhaps these experiences of natural beauty, struggle, and social cohesion are not the most profound soundings of spirituality. But they do have their own depths deserving of contemplation.

The storm can, of course, be seen as simply the cause of widespread inconvenience. It strands some of us and forces us to miss connections on trips and disrupts our work. Even many of us hardy New Englanders, at this point in the winter, wince at the prospect of yet another storm.

The searching soul, however, can find matter for pondering weather just like all the other areas of daily life. What happens in our world outside has its meaning for the world within.

Even when we remain inside the house and let the storm outside simply accompany whatever we choose to do, that has its virtues too.

This, at any rate, is what Billy Collins, currently poet laureate of the United States, suggests in a poem called “Snow.” About snow falling he writes:

“It falls so indifferently / into the spacious white parlor of the world, / if I were sitting here reading / in silence, / reading the morning paper / or reading Being and Nothingness, / not even letting the spoon / touch the inside of the cup,  / I have a feeling / the snow would even go perfectly with that.”

Richard Griffin

This week I am still mourning the death of a friend of many years. By current standards of longevity, Jack was not old when he died; his life was cut short by Alzheimer’s disease, that terrible illness which continues to afflict so many people.

Some four million Americans currently suffer from this disease, despite the intermittent progress achieved by scientists trying to discover a cure or a means of prevention.

Like others whom this disease has hit, my friend gradually lost the ability to think logically and to recognize other people. With the loss of memory, Jack eventually could no longer function on his own.

In time, he became resident in a special ward in a Veterans’ Administration hospital so that he could receive skilled professional care. Little by little, the disease broke down his body’s defenses until he finally succumbed.

Alzheimer’s disease and other related dementias, in addition to posing challenging medical questions for doctors and research scientists, also raise vital spiritual issues for all of us. When patients lose all mental ability to function on their own, what do they have left and how should they be treated?

The temptation is to think of them and deal with them as if they had ceased to be persons. In a society that tends to esteem people to the extent that they do something of monetary value, we can consider those afflicted with dementia as of no account and, moreover, a drain on the nation’s resources.

I am glad to report that my friend Jack’s family members and friends did not respond to his illness in this way. They continued to treat him as the unique person he was and showed him love and affection.

A colleague and friend, Stephen Sapp, has written insightfully about the spirituality of relating to people with dementia. A professor at the University of Miami and an ordained Presbyterian minister, Dr. Sapp has clearly reflected and, I suspect, prayed deeply about this subject.

His first bedrock principle is that all humans are “created in God’s own image and are worthy of respect and protection, especially those who cannot care for themselves or who do not measure up to the world’s standards of value.” Even if we cannot, or can no longer, produce anything or even think rationally, that does not make us any the less deserving of reverence.

Professor Sapp identifies several mistaken notions behind the common American negative attitudes toward people with Alzheimer’s.

First, if people are impaired in one way, we tend to judge them as deficient in many ways, even making of them deficient persons. Just because a person cannot remember names, for instance, does not mean they cannot profit from spiritual exercises. They may recognize in familiar words and sacred actions support from God in their struggle against the dark forces of their disease.

A second tendency is to judge declining brain ability as eliminating the person’s character, personality, and preferences. That can lead to ignoring patients’ lifelong taste for certain foods or other pleasures.

Another fallacy is to assume that the actions of people with dementia are meaningless. Some actions, apparently nonsensical, may have a significance for a sick person, except that we do not know what it is. A patient who wanders may in fact be seeking to perform some action that will guarantee his or her safety.

One woman with advanced Alzheimer’s used to scream loudly every time nursing home attendants took her for a bath. No one could figure out why that was happening. The water was not cold and she was not in pain or suffering for any other obvious reason. Finally, someone figured out that she was screaming because the door to the bathroom was being left open without regard for her dignity.

Ultimately, we do not know what goes on in the soul of a person with dementia. On the surface, only confusion may show but that does not mean nothing positive is happening inside.

There is no denying the terror that Alzheimer’s brings, but maintaining personal respect and reverence for the soul and body of the person afflicted brings us closer to the mystery of that person’s experience. And it may lead toward a spirituality that gives us the courage and insight to cope with a difficult situation.

Richard Griffin

For years, a truck filled with food has gone around the city where I live. On the outside of this vehicle are painted the words: “When I feed the poor, they call me a saint; when I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.”

The truck belongs to an agency called “Food For Free” that purchases fresh fruit and vegetables, receives left-over bread from bakeries, and then distributes most of it at 40 centers where poor people come. Agency staff members also make home deliveries to some people who are unable to get out. In warm weather, staffers glean food from area farms and also take contributions from farmers’ markets.

The quotation on the truck comes from the late Helder Camara who was archbishop of Recife in Brazil. Physically small, but spiritually a giant, Dom Helder (as his people called him) was widely known because of his passion for social justice. I had the privilege of spending time with him on two occasions in the 1970s when he visited Boston.

The work of this spiritual leader, who died in 1999 at age 90, came back to me this past week as I joined others in celebrating Janet Murray, a woman who has spent many years working with  Food  for Free, serving the hungry people of our community. On the occasion of her recent retirement, those who have supported her came together in a local movie theatre to honor her for her service to the poor.

There is something spiritually uplifting being with people who reach out to others in need. For me it serves as a moral tonic to talk with fellow citizens committed to the least fortunate in the community. They strike me as what another writer has called “wisdom people,” those who have discovered how serving others makes for a fulfilled life.

Janet Murray, typically of her, seemed to be just one of us in the crowd. Unassuming, ready to give credit to others, she radiates love for family members, friends, associates, and people like me who had simply come by to do her honor. Again, contact with such a person serves as a strong stimulus to be more giving of oneself.

Two weeks  previously, on Martin Luther King Day, I had stopped by a demonstration outside our city hall to talk with people who oppose making war against Iraq. On possibly the coldest day of the winter, some 450 people were parading in a large oblong formation, many holding signs and calling out their reasons why this war should not be started.

“I wasn’t happy about going out in the cold, I hate the cold, ” 87-year old Boone Schirmer told me. “I’ve broken the same hip twice and I’m deaf as a post,” he continued, “but I’m glad I went.”

His wife, Peggy Schirmer, is a year older, walks with difficulty, and is suffering through the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. “When you get old, you are more limited,” she told me. “But you live within your limits.” She and her husband went up and down the line twice, she in a wheelchair.

I found inspiration in such courage on the part of old people. Of course, it helps that I share their misgivings about the planned attack. Taking my cue from the bishops in my spiritual tradition, I remain unconvinced about the moral justification for undertaking this military action.

The stark contrast between the preparations for war against Iraq and the plight of the poor among us at home struck me forcibly. Chad Cover, who currently serves as director of Food for Free, puts this contrast clearly: “We’re willing to spend 100 billion dollars to fight a war, but we can’t provide basic social services to the needy.”

Like many another public servant,  Chad Cover draws inspiration for serving the poor from the spiritual tradition in which he grew up. And that same tradition moves many of us to resist the war that may  be fought in our name.

Following the lead of Helder Camara, I long for the day when our nation devotes more energy to finding out why so many people here and elsewhere in the world have to scrape for food, and less energy to building up the Pentagon’s budget.

Richard Griffin