The Hospital Experience of a Nun Chaplain
A hospital chaplain usually trains in the Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) at a hospital. This is training for the spiritual caregiver – religious ministry – of all faiths support staff members and patients regarding spiritual aspects of life. Hospital chaplains are trained to support faith systems across beliefs and traditions.
In the past, religious ritual was only performed in a church or temple. But now, services of religion are bringing to hospitals social and spiritual support. The Hospital Chapel is designed for doctors, nurses, staff members, patients, and their family so they can practice their faith inside the hospital.
We had chances to visit and volunteer for some hospitals in California, such as the Methodist Hospital (Arcadia)[1], Children’s Hospital (Los Angeles)[2], St. Joseph’s Hospital (Orange Center)[3], PIH Health Whittier Hospital (Whittier)[4], and West Covina Medical Center (West Covina)[5], and so forth.
In these hospitals, the chaplaincy office is specially designed for chaplains. We met and worked with these hospital chaplains. Some of them shared their experiences while working in these hospitals. These chaplains come from different faiths, such as Buddhism, Christianity and Catholicism. They sometimes work as individuals and sometimes as teams with no distinction or conflict with each other. The chaplain will talk with patients if these patients need them to counsel or perform blessing services.
Since chaplains and patients have different faiths, in the chapels different faith symbols are used while praying and meditating. The chaplain may go to the emergency room, recovery room, or praying room to perform religious services for patients. Chaplains maybe invited to the praying room if the patient passes away. They will come with family members of the deceased patient to perform religious rituals. At the same time, chaplains also counsel family members. The chaplain is an image of a spiritual caregiver in hospital, a reification ritual of religious response to the demands of patients.
The hospital chaplain, a spiritual caregiver, performs a ritual reification to respond to social needs, especially in the human healthcare aspect. Many people do not go to church or temple to perform the ritual, but that doesn’t mean they don’t like the church, temple or ritual. This is one of the reasons for the demand for chaplains. The importance is how ritual and ritual reification can benefit people. The place or location is not too important. Wherever ritual performance brings out the meaningful and is a helpful service for people, it is church or temple. This is also the main goal of ritual.
One time, I had a call for a volunteer. I got in an ambulance to transfer a female patient to a different hospital because of her incision. She was in a lot of pain and writhing. When she saw me in the form of a Vietnamese Buddhist nun, she expressed the need to not be alone. I moved closer to take her hand and told her that she would be transferred to the other hospital, where there are better conditions and skillful doctors. She would be treated there and recover sooner. She nodded and continued moaning softly. I stood aside to let the medical staff doing their duty. Then, I and the medical staff sat at the back seat of the ambulance with the patient. The patient felt a sharp pain in her stomach and said she was hurting so badly. I took her hand and said softly that she could try to recite the name of Guanyin Bodhisattva and this Bodhisattva will bless her well. I recited Namo Quan Yin Bodhisattva together with her during the trip.
When we arrived hospital, I did not forget to remind her to recite the name of the Bodhisattva for blessings. After that, I wished for her to get well soon and then we left. When this patient recovered, she visited my temple (Liên Hương Temple, La Puente, California) and thanked me for helping her. She shared with me that she seemed to receive magical powers from the Guan Yin Bodhisattva, who had blessed her for when she was in surgery. Even the doctors said that she was very fortunate to have transferred at the right time and to have had a very successful surgery. From that day onward, she always recites the name of Guan Yin Bodhisattva. Her belief and gratitude to the Bodhisattva is now firm. I am very happy about that. I think that, in addition to my daily practices in the temple, I need to engage more in social aspects, especially in the field of hospital chaplaincy. To me, when in this position, I can help those who need a strong faith and spirituality to overcome their physical pain.
Through the volunteer experience above, I think that when seriously ill, sick people cannot go to the temple to pray. These patients really need spiritual care. Buddhist caregiving is still lacking, so it is important to have Buddhist figures or Buddhist monastics who are willing to care for the spiritual needs of patients so that they can quickly recover from their suffering.
Besides attending to patients, we need to research our Buddhist doctrine so that we can share with patients in the field of interfaith chaplaincy and harmonize with other chaplains. As interfaith chaplains working with different faiths, we are trained to respect other’s beliefs. We learn and share the best of religions and support each other to help people in need.
In a conversation with another chaplain, a Christian chaplain points out that in his belief, the “sheep metaphor” or “shepherd” in the pasture, the chaplain, is used to depict the image of chaplaincy care. The evidence is shown in the Bible, such as “Jesus is shepherd” who takes care of the sheep, or statements such as “I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father, and I lay down my life for the sheep.”[6] This myth reflects the image of the chaplaincy care of Jesus who had much love for the people. The Christian chaplain asked me whether there is a similar image in Buddhism? In this situation, we need to find out which scriptures describes the Buddha as a chaplain and how the Buddha cared for people and community.
There are many people, including Buddhists, who also trust the “myth buster.” Thus, “sheep” is just the metaphor to describe the chaplaincy care in the Christian tradition. So, is there any chaplaincy authority in Buddhism? The answer can be found in the section, “Buddha as a Pastoral Caregiver” in A Handbook on Buddhist Pastoral Care Part I,[7] which is written by Dr. Pamela Ayo Yetunde.
In this handbook, Dr. Yetunde points out that in the Pāli Canon there are many sutras that instruct one to work as a pastoral caregiver. During the Buddha's time, cows lived in pastures and the people who took care of cows were called cowherds. The Buddha and his disciples are also called cowherds. However, the cowherd is just a metaphor. The Buddha and his disciples are indeed not cowherds. They are the spiritual guides, counselors and teachers. This metaphor is described fully in the Shorter Discourse on the Cowherd Sutra of the Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha (MN 34 Cula Gopalaka Sutta). In this sutra, the Buddha makes known to us eleven techniques to take care of the cow. Through these eleven techniques, the Buddha wants to advise monastics to take care of other people and the community.
Furthermore, the practice of pastoral care reminds me of the teaching of the Four Sublime States, the Brahmavihāras. We can apply this teaching to our chaplain career. The Brahmavihāras consists of:
- Mettā: loving-kindness or benevolence
- Karuṇā: compassion
- Muditā: empathetic joy
- Upekkha: equanimity
Personally, I think that if pastoral caregivers want to succeed when serving patients, they should widely practice these Brahmavihāra factors.
There are many fields in society that need both a chaplain and Buddhist engagement. That is why I, along with many friends, who practice with the e teachings of the Brahmavihāras, engage in working outside the temple to serve people and society, such as in the army, hospitals, prisons, and schools. As monastics, learning and working in a hospital as a chaplain is a challenge, because we need to skillfully apply the teaching of the Buddha to care for people so that they don’t think that we are proselytizing. This is a process of bringing the benefit of the Buddha’s teaching and the image of Buddhists to engage in resolving the suffering of people, especially in the hospital.
Liên Hương Temple, California, April 21, 2020
Respectfully,
Bhikkhunī Phước Nhẫn
[1] https://www.methodisthospital.org/
[3] https://www.providence.org/locations/st-joseph-hospital-orange/wound-care-center#llaid=2267
[4] https://www.pihhealth.org/patients-visitors/spiritual-care/-clinical-pastoral-education/
[5] https://www.hasc.org/member-hospital/west-covina-medical-center
[6] KJV/NIV Parallel: New Testament in Greek and English (Zondervan, 1990). John 10: 14-15 (NIV). P. 302.
[7] Dharma Care “A handbook on Buddhist pastoral Care part one” by Pamela Ayo Yetunde, M.A. Chaplain and Pastoral Counselor, trang 9. https://dharmacare.com/dharma-care-handbook.
1.18._The_Hopital_Experience_of_A_Nun_Chaplain_-_TN_Phuoc_Nhan.pdf
