Shopping for faith in life

Friday, October 17, 1997

Shopping for faith in life

FAITH: Residents of convalescent home share experiences and
religion

Just like some people go shopping for sneakers, the other day I
decided to pick up some faith. I felt that worrying about the
future and how I was going to make it was keeping me from getting
the most out of life.

The best people to get shoes or faith from, I thought, would be
the ones who have extensive experience using their product. I
wanted to speak to those who had walked through stormy weather.
They would know that unlike shoes, faith should be a product that
doesn’t wear out: It should have an eternal guarantee.

So I visited a local convalescent home. The people there would
know what had failed them and what had uplifted them during their
lives. Their products would not be in sexy packages; they would
bare it all.

I had butterflies in my stomach because I wasn’t sure how my
visit was going to go, as if this shopping experience would in fact
be a race that I needed to win.

Upon my arrival at the convalescent home, I was accosted by the
nurse in charge, who wanted to know who I was. After babbling
something about being a Christian, I had to reassure her that I was
not a religious extremist. She demanded to see proof, and since it
is a well known fact that religious extremists don’t attend UCLA, I
presented my student-identification card. (I had not yet availed
myself of the stylish new BruinCard.) After watching her scrutinize
it, I was past my first hurdle.

The abrupt, jumpy and condescending nurse demanded that I
address the patients who were deposited in front of a television
screen, which flared light at those still awake. "Oh, no," I told
her, "I came here to lend someone my ear, to record a life and not
to entertain."

The nurse said I should talk to Jim, the local hero. He had been
a World War II fighter pilot, architect and writer. Since he was
momentarily on the phone, I had to fend for myself in the
meantime.

That’s when I started navigating through corridors littered with
quiescent beings, only to run aground with a lady who "didn’t know
what to talk about" and who was "not a good conversationalist." I
scrutinized the denizens, wondering what they were seeing that I
was too sane to see. The musty smell made me dread the thought of
living in a hospital with bare walls and empty expressions.

As I was amidst my thoughts, I noticed a lady poring over the
pages of Forbes. We’ll call this frail woman Janet. I was aghast to
see the condition she was in. I learned that she had been treated
for a brain tumor a year ago and was only now recovering some
control over her body.

She spoke of being a lawyer as if it were yesterday. As if she
could sense my apprehension, she reassured me of my desire to be
there and warned me that trying to talk to people would be
frustrating. I was still hoping that this was the place to find
what I was looking for.

Her uncanny cheerfulness made me curious, so I asked her the
question that would explain everything, "So how do you do it?"

The big smile on her face made me forget the rest of her, as she
proclaimed that God had seen her through. "How long have you
believed?" I wanted to know. She replied that her faith had
swallowed up every struggle "her whole life."

To help explain why she was joyful, she referred me to Matthew
25:35-36: "For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat, I
was thirsty, and you gave me drink; I was a stranger, and you
invited me in; naked, and you clothed me; I was sick, and you
visited me; I was in prison, and you came to me." She spoke those
words with confidence. I believed that she had run life’s race
well, having placed her faith in God. The hurdles she had set in
front of her had helped her stay in the race and kept her focused
on what would deliver her through the finish line into life
eternal.

I slipped her shoes on for size and walked around. When one of
the nurses came over, we linked hands and prayed for all those
without hope and for our own faiths to grow stronger. As I left
this affectionate woman, I knew I had to share her hope in God with
another who did not have the armor to keep the "slings and arrows
of outrageous fortune" from piercing his heart.

Jim, who is 78 years old, is paralyzed from the waist down and
has been in the convalescent home for seven years. He learned his
life’s work from Frank Lloyd Wright, the greatest architect of the
century. Jim was a sharp and cogent man, who had backlogged a
colorful life. Although he had reasons to have faith in himself, it
was sad to see him so disheartened to now be a "cripple." I asked
to hear about his now faltering faith.

The way he explained it was that being bedridden, one does a lot
of soul searching. Full of regrets, he would live differently if he
had it to do over again. Now he can see that he should have adhered
to a single teaching in order to understand our purpose in the
world. In his travels around the globe, the best he could ever do
was dabble in religions, and the pantheistic view of nature as god
seemed to make the least demands on him, so he took it.

Still, he searches for something more comforting. He could
understand that I had come to him to bring him God’s love. He
started smiling more often and lamented at the rarity of anyone
actually being willing to speak with him. I knew that God had not
been cruel to Jim, although he was beaten in his own race, he still
had the opportunity to finish first in the greatest race the world
has ever known. Once having done everything, he must now figure out
how to live for something more than writing letters.

Janet and Jim were running different races. Jim, although a
superb sportsman who ran his race strong, now doesn’t like where it
led him. The race had been enjoyable, and he doesn’t want to
finish. Janet has had more setbacks in her race and she wasn’t
quite as swift, but she is running for the finish line stronger
than she has ever been. For Janet, the prize was eternal life with
God, and the race was incidental. I gave Jim hope that God has not
forgotten him, though the rest of the world seems to have. For
Janet, I was another confirmation of the validity of her faith in
God. My hope for Jim, is that he too will find the peace that is in
people like Janet.

My naivete about the existence of faith in society was lost
during my visit. I thought that I would see spiritual giants,
however decrepit their bodies were. I was not prepared to see the
people most needing faith having none.

I had thought that dire circumstances would prod anyone into
believing. Yet, some people, however broken they become, will not
be persuaded simply by events to let go of their egotism and
self-righteousness.

We don’t know how kind age is going to be to us. Some of us may
have similar fates and even if we are fortunate to have a good end,
we can encourage faith in others. Riches, renown and even memories
will fail us eventually. For faith there is no substitute. Faith
does not pop out of a primordial soup, but it needs to be watered,
pruned and exposed to the light.

Discovering the importance of my own faith in God gave me the
stamina to run alongside others during their more strenuous
journeys. It’s not everyday that I encounter two people who want to
be my friends while I am out shopping for anything, let alone an
extraordinary thing like faith.

I leaned on my faith to overcome imaginary apprehensions,
discouraging responses and a daunting nurse. In one instance,
rather than just getting to look over a script for faith, I got to
see it played out on the really big screen. In the other, I learned
how my faith is valuable for those who are without any.

As I pulled away from that bastion of life experiences, I left
behind more than a nondescript building. Inside, some people were
dealing with life for the first time.

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