Grief + Holy Spaces
By Kristin Good
I was training our new students on End of Life care last week – a group of four adults who are choosing to spend the next 10 weeks working as Chaplain Interns here at the hospital. I was explaining various hospitality aspects to keep in mind when we get called to end of life situations: different religious, ritual, and emotional assessments to be made. To illustrate some points, I told a story from a couple months ago – I had a teenage patient who had been on my unit for two weeks due to a gunshot wound. For the sake of HIPPA, we will call him “Matt.”
Matt was never conscious since arriving at the hospital – he was quickly put on a ventilator and remained sedated as the medical team tried different interventions to help him recover. I was able to get to know his older sister well in those two weeks – she was always there, at the bedside of her baby brother, holding his hand and talking to him just in case he could hear her. Two weeks into Matt’s hospitalization, the team had no other options that would offer the quality of life that Matt would want – his family made the heartbreaking decision to transition to comfort care, which would quickly lead to his death.
I received a call that his family wanted me to provide a final prayer before turning off the ventilator. When I walked into Matt’s room, his sister made her way over to me through the 20+ loved ones gathered in the small hospital room, and without saying a word, just hugged me. I felt her body get heavy as she deeply sighed, and so much was said in the silence of that hug – heartbreak, anger, prayer, the loss of hope. When we pulled apart, I looked her in the eyes, knowing full well that no words I could offer would make this day any less painful, I squeezed her hand, and I made my way to the head of Matt’s bed. With the sounds of sniffles and medical machines as the background noise, I introduced myself to the crowded room of loved ones.
Before the prayer, I invited them to share stories with me so I could get to know the Matt that they knew so well. Immediately, person after person started sharing about how goofy he was; how well dressed he always wanted to be; what a ladies man he was. I heard about how much he loved his mom and how his older sisters were his best friends. I heard about dreams that he had and adventures he had taken. There were waves of stories, silence, laughter, tears, and more silence. After facilitating that time of storytelling – hand and hand with Matt and his family, I recited Psalm 23 and offered a final prayer for peace and comfort. When I was finished, the medical team came in to turn off his ventilator – his family played the song ‘Come Jesus Come’ by Stephen McWhirter on repeat – and Matt died within 13 minutes.
After sharing that story with the interns, one of them asked me why this job feels worth doing. Without hesitation, I shared how much of an honor it feels to be in those moments with people. Moments where the line between life and death, between humanity and the divine feels so thin – I cannot think of a better way to spend my days than that. The next day, Nathan reached out to me about writing something up on Holy Spaces that I encounter at work – it all felt very fitting.
In reflection of the story shared above, it was not the Psalm reading or final prayer that made that experience feel sacred – it was the hug with Matt’s sister. It was the stories told, the laughter, the silence, the tears. The collision of deep love and deep grief that ushers in a vulnerability that allows connection to one another and God so much more tangible. In a situation that someone would think God was far away from – a teenager dying of gun violence – somehow felt like God was actually right there with us. I can confidently say that in the hundreds of rooms that I have sat in at time of death, sharing similar moments with families, it always feels like that. Whether they believe in the same God I do or not – the humanity, the honesty, the connection of it all is about as holy as I’ve ever known anything to be.
I am frequently asked how my job impacts my belief in a ‘good God.’ More than anything, I think my definition of what a ‘good God’ is has been the thing that has shifted. I used to believe that God’s goodness was contingent on how I was feeling or how enjoyable/easy/comfortable my life was. I began to notice that some of my biggest disagreements with the belief of God’s goodness came when I did not get what I wanted or a situation did not happen the way I wanted it to happen. What I have come to believe is that God’s goodness is so much bigger than things going the way I hoped, and has everything to do with God’s presence in the midst of it all.
I believe with everything in me that God was present in that room, grieving with us as Matt took his final breath. When I think about the weekend my best friend was in brain surgery and we found out about her cancer, I think about how held I felt in the waiting room by God – I will always say that weekend was somehow one of the hardest and most sacred weekends of my life; those two experiences did not disqualify one another. If anything, the fear, pain, and heartache of that experience highlighted God’s presence in a unique way – and in a way I have now seen time and time again. As I have continued to befriend grief and discomfort in both my professional and personal life, I have become more confident of believing in a God that enters into the mess of it all with me. That is not scared of my pain or my anger or my grief, and actually invites me to experience it with all honesty, knowing that I am not alone.
It is because of that confidence in God’s presence that I continue to be reminded how holy those moments at work continue to be. And whatever I witness in those hospital rooms, I know in my bones that something bigger than myself is present and witnessing the same thing, and somehow is holding me near – and that is what I would consider to be a Holy Space.
Kristin Good is a hospital chaplain in Denver. She has been part of Sacred Grace since 2023 and is part of the Teaching Team.
