Old friends

God has blessed me with opportunities to live, work, study, and minister all over the Midwest. This means I have wonderful loved ones throughout Indiana, Illinois, Iowa and Missouri. A truly formative time in my younger days was from Sept. 2003-Aug. 2004 as I spent a year as a chaplain at a hospital. I served alongside dozens of amazing people, including Rev. Tim.

CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) operates on a quarterly basis. My spring quarter, there was 5 of us working and studying closely together. Four of us were residents: myself, Rev. Tim, Deacon Gordon, and the infamous A. Rev. Christen was a student who later became a resident. To say we spent a lot of time together would be an understatement.

As residents, we were required to do a large number of 12-hour on-call shifts each month. We also had classes we had to take twice/week and hospital wings we were required to visit to check on patients' spiritual needs. It wasn't unusual to be on campus 50+ hours/week. In classes we shared our life stories and explored how they impacted our ministry. Once/week someone had to offer  pastoral counseling to someone in front of the class. About a real-life problem. And you were critiqued in how you counsel. It was intense, amazing, and wonderful.

A had always been a pain-in-the-neck and his antics increased that spring semester. We couldn't talk about him at work so Rev. Tim created a beautiful yahoo group called the AFZ standing for the A Free Zone. We could freely talk, gossip, vent, and bitch about A. Classy? Perhaps  not, but it got us through a rough few months and solidified our friendship as a foursome.

To say we were an odd mix of friends would be an understatement. Our age difference spans ~40 years, we are all different denominations, and have all different lifestyles/family situations. I love each of them dearly. They will/always be my chaplain brothers and sister.

With the exception of his love of University of Michigan football, Tim is a great guy. He is witty, intelligent, compassionate, and fun to be around. Save for a few emails from about 2004-2007 and a brief cup of coffee in Pittsburgh in Dec. 2004 (I was at a conference and he was a pastor in that area), we haven't seen each other. I recalled he was in the same general area of the country as I am, but it took me over a year of living here to get off my duff and touch base with him. I was thrilled to learn he was just 40 minutes away and a quick email reconnected us. Today, we finally saw each other for the first time in 9 years.

There was some catching up- his kids and wife, my divorce and moves, etc. We talked denominations- Pope Francis and the elected head of his denomination. We talked parish-specific talk as well. Big surprise.

Fascinatingly enough, Tim has some needs in regards to children's catechesis and ministry in his parish- something I know a thing or two about.  When we worked/studied together, Deacon Gordon showed us a method they used at his parish- something called Catechesis of the Good Shepherd. I knew very little about CGS at the time and, of course, had no inkling it would become my life's work and passion. Rev. Tim hadn't forgotten our visit to Gordon's parish either. My reconnecting email mentioned I had become involved in CGS and Tim was full of questions when we met. The idea of helping a friend bring something I love dearly to his parish is beyond exciting. It may or may not happen, of course. It may take years. That doesn't matter. Sometimes it's fun to minister with/to/for people outside of the folks you're paid to minister to!

Mostly, I am thrilled to have a dear friend, in ministry, living so close. We have similar professional lifestyles and schedules. We can safely vent since our hierarchy don't interact directly. When I said we'll see each other soon, but perhaps not until after the holidays, he got it. The coming weeks will no doubt be filled with Advent duties for both of us at our respective parishes followed by the joyous Christmas season. On Jan. 7th life will become somewhat normal again  for both of us and we'll (hopefully) be able to make time to meet regularly.