Conversation with a Seminary student over coffee . . . (page 2)

Excerpt from I WEPT BY THE RIVERS of BABYLON (A Prisoner of Conscience in a Time of War)

I motored over to Dub's house. It is early Sunday
morning and he's ready to go even though I'm early.
We drove to the rehabilitation hospital.
"Who can volunteer to provide some Spiritual
encouragement for the patients on the 3rd floor of
Texas Rehabilitation Hospital?" Dub’s Bible study
group at the Unity Church had been asked by hospital
coordinators.
Dub jumped at the chance. “Jumped” is perhaps the
wrong word. Dub has a missing leg. At least the original
organic part is missing.
A prosthetic device has replaced it. You might call it his
"stand in.”
Dub used to be a Baptist preacher. In fact, he studied at
3 seminaries. Now, he is eighty-five. Involuntarily he
"retired" from the ministry after a car crash crushed his
leg and dislodged his left eye. That was in 2003. It was a
life changer for him!
His world and worldview, he had confided, turned
upside down over night. He was no longer "viable" as a
Pastor. This was his Church’s verdict. Inevitably, he was
unplugged from active relevance in not only the church
but his family as well. His eyes were opened to
unpleasant awareness. Life was going to be very
different!

99
Dub Horn began questioning things. He set aside his
rigid mindset. His new self-accepted the freedom of new
opportunity. A chance to be of some service to others
doesn't come often (if at all) for a man in his 80's.
He was eager to take on the special job of visitation and
morale booster for the third floor at the rehab ward. If
ever a man was well-suited for such a task it was Dub.
That's where I came in.
Although I had never before volunteered for charity
work, I thought it was time I left my comfort zone and
offered “mankind” some payback. It was time to care
about others.
Dub was a regular customer of mine at the bookstore
where I worked: Half-Price Books.
For an avid reader such as me it was a
dream-come-true.
My job was to sort and shelve books in the Religion and
Philosophy sections.
About once or twice a week, Dub would putter up in his
motorized wheelchair and meander back to the Religion
section searching for a chat.
I could tell right away he was warmly knowledgeable.
He also displayed a pleasant "people person" manner.
We clicked. ‘Very cheery man’, I thought.

100
Soon after my retirement, Dub and I met for coffee once
a week and we’d catch up. He turned to me one day and
said, "I've got a job for you if you're interested. . .”
Something inside me responded positively to the
suggestion and I accepted although I confess, I had
never done this sort of thing before. I had no idea what
was ahead, but, it isn't too often at my age (mid-sixties)
I can indulge a fresh, positive experience.
The third floor of Rehab Hospital is vast. It is dedicated
to special cases that aren't nominally a perfect fit. As a
matter of fact, the people who reside there have little
actual hope of rehabilitation. These particular patients
have a terminal prognosis.
Dub and I arrived. I parked in the Handicap zone and
Dub hung his special sign on my rearview. I unloaded
Dub’s case and we took the long trek upstairs to the 3rd
floor. There I unpacked the speakers for music and
organized his clippings and print-outs and connected
speaker wires to his iPad.
This particular Sunday morning, after setting up the CD
player with soothing Old Time Gospel music (foreign to
my virgin ears), I took a seat on the nearby couch. This
room for visitors and patients is arranged comfortably
with actual home-style furniture.
After a few minutes, one by one, the cavalcade of wheel
chairs arrives. Nurses tool them in and position the
seating arrangement into a spacious semi-circle.
(Imagine a large den with cushy furniture and nobody
seated on anything but their wheelchairs.)

101
Unexpectedly, I was rather shaken by my first sight of
three catatonic patients ferried in and arrayed in the
front of the room. Each was elderly, frail and contorted
in some physical manner.
I held my breath involuntarily until I finally confronted
them as people and realized what their state of being
was and how their minds were trapped in unresponsive
bodies!
I squirmed inside my own healthy body. (It felt like
guilt.) I actually had to remind myself: This isn’t about
you, Terry, this isn’t about you.
The first catatonic person, a middle-aged lady, merely
slumped with her head drooped down, with doll's eyes
partly closed. The second woman’s head permanently
tilted as if to examine the ceiling.
One other patient was a stare-straight-ahead lady, inert
in a way impossible for me to comprehend.
All the usual possibilities for social interaction did not
apply. At least, so it seemed to me. Being cordial or
friendly had always seemed to be about manners and
conversation, gestures, and formality.
None of that meant anything in this situation.
A rude thought intruded: an impression of awkward,
discomfiting statues and not people. (This was a living
person?)
Immediately, other patients wheeled in by nurses,
wedged the interstices in a loose array.

102
Another white-haired lady who hummed or sang
wordlessly without tune caught my attention. She, for
an hour and a half, continued the singsong, deeply
rooted in her own lodged “memory."
Next to her sat an alert woman actively engaging
everybody and nobody in particular. Every sentence
commenced with, "I adopted two kids in Nigeria. … In
school they call the boy I adopted 'the rich kid' because
I sent him clothes and shoes. … I have photographs…."
Over and again this person shared her one essential
thought with the group, perhaps like a phonograph
needle, her brain is stuck in one groove….always.
On her left was a Church of Christ member (so she told
us) who responded to everything Dub would say by
repeating it exactly as a human echo.
When either of us would say something aloud one
particular lady spoke up to say “You’re a wonderful
man” It never failed to sound perfectly sincere.
This woman appeared as though she had just arrived
home from church. Her grooming was perfect and her
sweet smile glowed with benevolence.
Before our hour and a half had ended, she had repeated
that pet phrase exactly fifteen times. (I know, I counted
for some obsessive reason of my own!) “You’re a
wonderful man. You’re a wonderful man.”
Each utterance was as though for the very first time.
I had burrowed into myself emotionally at this point. I
confess I had become an observer, as though I were in a
strange jungle of indescribable flora and fauna.

103
An outsider in a strange new world, I asked myself,
“What next?”
****
The last man in our crowded parlor was a dignified
ninety-year-old black gentleman who informed us
modestly he had been a Deacon in his church for many
years.
He confessed he was no longer good at sharing
conversationally but could express himself in song. We
did not hesitate to encourage him!
He began crooning, "He Touched Me," in a mellow, deep
voice that lovingly caressed each phrase. I listened
enthralled by the power of his performance.
Dub’s face shone moist with tears flowing from his eyes
as I suddenly experienced something unaccustomed
and unidentifiable inside. An emotion was escaping
from the prison of my soul as the Deacon’s plaintive
song ended on a pianissimo of gentle praise.
Dub choked out, "When I had my head-on collision and
lost my leg, I was in the hospital for six months. One
day, a pretty young lady came to the hospital and up to
my room and sang that same song for me: "He Touched
Me". I felt like God wanted me to know he cared about
my suffering. . ..."
At this point, I should mention an incessant background
sound floating in the air.
It was a woman's plaintive voice repeating a phrase
from a distance. Perhaps she was in another room?

104
It grew louder until her bed appeared at the doorway as
the floor nurse wheeled her in and trundled her to the
back of the room and locked the brake on the bed’s
wheels.
We heard her voice so often it became the patter of rain
or the sound of wind in an uncomfortable downpour.
She called politely but beseechingly!
"Help me, please. Somebody help me. Please help me,
somebody."
None of the patients blinked an eye her way. Dub gave
me a searching look.
Shortly, I couldn't bear it any longer. I jumped up and
went in search of hospital personnel. I caught up with a
nurse. She listened to me and then shook her head
despairingly. "She does this. She can't help it. We aren't
ignoring her. It is just her thing; part of her symptom."
Let me tell you, if you are hearing it for the first time
you feel like a monster for not rushing over and trying
to do. . .what? Something. Anything. The awful reality of
it is: there is nothing to be done!
One middle-aged fellow who had suffered a stroke sat in
his wheelchair. His wife stood behind him constantly
patting him on the arms or rubbing his shoulder in
perpetual reassurance and consolation.
She was unfailingly encouraging and tender. I recited to
myself silently, "In sickness and in health. . ."
The man's face owned one expression and it never
changed: oblivion. He might well have been a drawing
of a man.

105
Dub stood and explained to everybody we were not
there to preach to them but to "encourage them.”
Dub Horn is very good at this. Let me tell you; what he
says and does is outside of my experience as the
Jehovah's Witness I once was for 20 years. There had
been no such thing as charity for strangers, only fellow
members.
You might say we thought our message was charity
enough.
Dub’s manner is tenderly personal yet neutral as to an
agenda. He smiles genuinely and asks simple questions
and gives affirmations. He has no reading material to
peddle in order to acquire a convert. He is a beacon and
there are always troubled ships foundering out there on
rough seas. Unglamorous and yet, magnificent…my
friend is anonymous, invisible as he speaks.
"We are here today because God wants us to be
together to encourage one another. We don't have to get
out and go to a big fancy church to do that. We just
gather and His Spirit is with us."
There are a few nods and an old fashioned "amen" or
two from the Deacon. I am amused.
Dub continues…
"Why are we still here? Why are we living so long with
so many discouraging problems in our health? I'll tell
you why: God still has something important for each
one of us to do with our lives before he calls us home."

106
I immediately call to mind the line in Rime of the
Ancient Mariner: “He listens as a three years child; the
Mariner hath his will.”
Among our tight group are faces which are mostly flesh
facades. The patients seem impassive at first, yet… do I
see a flicker of change?
(This is not possible, I’m projecting and not seeing
anything.)
Dub smiled. He was light and conversational. He sat on a
tall cushion about 3 feet off the floor at about eye-level
to those seated in wheelchairs.
"What does God want with us? What is our purpose
now that we can hardly move about any longer? Well,
what are we doing today? We are just sitting here,
right? Did you know, by YOU being here with me, you
have encouraged me? That's what you've done for ME

That's what you've done for ME today.
I hope I can do the same for you and tell you: “God
knows you and loves you and will never leave you in
your time of distress."
What I like about his delivery is that it has no
“preacher” in it at all.
He is just a person, a civilian, a fellow sufferer who has
spent his last 8 or 9 years struggling against setback
after setback. He is real.
The faces of the catatonic listeners reflect. . .something. .
. again, I can't exactly say what it is. . ..but, it is definitely
a change of character or mood. . .or. . .

107
I'd compare it to looking out upon a lake and the water
is reflecting the movement of the clouds.
Dub continues. . .
"I'm here to encourage you to love. God is love. He lives
in us when we love. Some of you cannot move and yet
your mind moves. You can hear. You can think. God has
your undivided attention you might say.”
"Search in your own heart.”
“Is there somebody in your life who has wronged you?
If you say to yourself 'I hate so-and-so,’ you aren't
hurting them one little bit. But, you are hurting
yourself.”
“Let go of that. Forgive. Feel love instead of hate for that
person who wronged you. It won't do anything for
them—but I'll tell you truly: it will allow the love of God
to shine inside you."
The energy in this visiting room has as a kind of
weather change occurring between sunlight and clouds
before a rain. I think I am sensing something.
Dub grins and starts to sing: "This Little Light of Mine,
I'm gonna let it shine. . .."
He waves his hands like a maestro before a motionless
orchestra as he sings… and slowly…a few voices join
him!
As this goes on, more wheelchairs with more patients
are pushed into the room. One new lady is profoundly
affected by some sort of palsy.

108
Her head and eyes roll constantly. It is disconcerting to
encounter for the first time! One of the other ladies cries
aloud: "She's crazy!"
Dub stops singing and calmly holds his hand toward the
unkind remark palm down and quietly remonstrates:
“We don't say that. . .we say. . .she has different
opportunities than the rest of us. . ."
The offending lady immediately sees wisdom in this.
"Yes. Yes she does. She has different opportunities than
the rest of us."
And the singing continues, "Let it shine, let it shine, let it
shine."
By the end of our time in that Visiting room, I can feel all
sorts of things happening inside of me I file away for
thinking about later. Mostly, I reflect on how very little
of my life spent as a Jehovah's Witness was an actual
outreach to somebody with profound physical needs to
gift them with anything simple like companionship or a
word of encouragement. It seems my purpose before
was more of prospecting for customers. (Peculiar
thought!)
It shook me and rocked my world on that amazing 3rd
floor. So little can really mean so much!
I called to mind a moment when I sat with a Witness
friend in a shopping mall food court sipping coffee years
earlier. A deaf man approached our table as we were
talking.

109
The man silently offered my companion his card with
American Sign Language printed on it. It requested a
donation.
My JW friend looked toward him appraisingly and asked
slowly: "You can't hear?" He watched the fellow as he
articulated his gestured reply.
Then, my JW friend shook his head "No."
He handed the card back. The deaf fellow nodded at him
and walked off to another table. The friend turned to
me, apparently pleased with himself.
“I watched his eyes as I spoke to see if he was reading
my lips or not. If he’s really deaf, he will. If not, he’s
faking.” What made me uncomfortable about that at the
time? I thought about it today for some reason. Why
must we judge the needs of others? Why had I just sat
there like a stone?
Dub has experienced a wonderful visitation this
amazing Sunday and so have I. I speculated to my
cheerful companion making remarks concerning each
person we met up on the 3rd floor. Who are they now
compared with what they once were? What sort of life
was theirs?
I jabber compulsively for a while. Relief is needed. It is
as if I have to debrief myself and talk endlessly about
our experience to deal with the feelings I'm
experiencing. One part of me wanted to flee in terror
when I first got there and the other part wanted to hug
everybody.

110
Dub sums it all up nicely. "When we give we always get
more in return."
Why hadn't I ever felt this way before? I had to ask.
Dub smiles and shakes his head saliently, “It isn’t about
you.”
And then I suddenly see as if for the first time
It is back!
The tickle of original feeling from when I was only five
has returned!
The original God who didn’t need a name is present in
the act of giving, caring.
Perhaps I am like the Samaritan apostate who listens to
conscience?
Perhaps I don’t have to be the Priest after all.
*****
<Snip> End Excerpt

Conversation with a Seminary student over coffee . . .

James Brown

Terry

Terry

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