Thoughts from the St. Paul Staff

Very recently my wife and I saw and experienced the stage drama entitled "The Diary of Anne Frank" at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis. It was superly written and adapted for the stage from the real life experiences of the young Jewish girl Anne Frank, her family, and three other Jewish people hiding from the Nazi Gestapo in an attic in Amsterdam for just over two years late in World War II. It was not a joyous or happy picture, but it was realistic to life during difficult times. "The Diary of Anne Frank" caused me to do a lot of thinking, some of which may speak to you who read these words on St. Paul Church's website.

The built-in-by-God basic urge to live as long as this earthly life has meaning and purpose was marvelously revealed by Anne Frank as she and the others lived through scary days and nights, always in fear that they might be found out by the Gestapo and shipped off with thousands of other Jewish people in crowded cattle trains to Nazi concentration/ annihilation camps. Anne could even be lively and happy in an effervesant way, although she was very human in other ways. She was the one who helped keep hope and zest in the extremely limited life the nine hidden Jews were forced to uindergo. Even though Anne Frank and the others were eventually betrayed to the Gestapo by some unknown informant and all but her father were killed in the gas chambers at Auschwitz, Anne's indomit-able spirit speaks to each of us.

There are times when I'm visiting shut-in's related to St. Paul Church that I sense this same indomitable spirit, the same strong hope and zest to go on living. And that's in spite of the difficult and sometimes desperate situations a shut-in is living in. Rather often I feel humbled and sometimes even in awe as I experience in those folks this indomitable spirit that reflects a very lively hope and zest for living. At those times, I am learning from and feeding on the uplifting spirit of shut-in's, and I'm deeply thankful for those opportunities.

At other times, I hear some folks talk openly and longingly about death, their own death, so they can be released from the heaviness and hopeless-ness of the physical problems and the living conditions they have to live under. Given what these good people are dealing with, I can easily identify with them when they say, "I'm ready for my death to come. In fact, I look forward to it a great deal." At times, someone asks me, "Why doesn't God take me? I'm certainly ready and I'm not able to be any good to anybody like this." That's when I hope God guides my words, because I don't have any humanly understandable words of my own to say.  In moments like these, when I experience someone's indomitable spirit or hear a person's strong desire to die soon, I try to reflect some of God's love to the shut-in I'm talking with at that moment. Sometimes I recall these words of Martin Luther King, Jr., "Hatred paralyzes life, love releases it. Hatred confuses life, love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life, love illuminates it." Hopefully my words, my attitude, my prayer in these moments communicates love to the shut-in I'm visiting. If so, I'm fulfilling a bit of God's purpose for me in my calling on folks who may be dealing with some pretty difficult and even hopeless circumstances.

Pastor Herb Schafale
Minister of Visitation