Episode 12: Chaplaincy at The House
“Episode #12: Chaplaincy at The House” by Sue Lanza and Shawn Carty. Released: 2022. Track 12. Genre: podcast.
Transcription
Sue Lanza:
Hi, everyone and welcome to another episode of House Guest, the podcast about all things related to The House of The Good Shepherd, a retirement community in Hackettstown, New Jersey. I’m Sue Lanza, the CEO, and I’m joined today by my co-host the Reverend Rev. Shawn Carty, who is our chaplain. Please enjoy.
Good afternoon, Sean. How are you this afternoon?
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I’m very well. How are you, Sue?
Sue Lanza:
I’m doing amazingly well.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Good.
Sue Lanza:
I’d like to say hi, and this is episode number 12 that we’re-
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Is it 12? We’re an even dozen now.
Sue Lanza:
And even dozen.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Imagine that.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah, [inaudible] get to a baker’s dozen.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Oh, there we go.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Lucky 13 then.
Sue Lanza:
We have a wonderful topic today that I know most podcasts are not covering. So I’m feeling great about this topic.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Oh, really? What is it?
Sue Lanza:
Chaplaincy at The House of The Good Shepherd. I’m wondering if you have any vital information about this.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I may have a thing or two to say about this.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah?
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yes, in fact.
Sue Lanza:
Well, good. This will be interesting because I know I’m going to learn a little bit because I know some, but I know I don’t know all. Can you start out by maybe telling us and defining actually what a chaplain is? I know you like to have things defined.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, I love words. And so-
Sue Lanza:
Words.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
… The word chaplain comes from chapel of course. And the distinction here is that a chapel is different from a church.
Sue Lanza:
See? I’m learning stuff already.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Now you know. So a chapel typically is a very specific, unlimited ministry. A church is a general purpose church, general purpose ministry. It’s in a town, it’s got all kinds of people coming to it, coming and going. A chapel tends to be very specific. So it’s for particular places. You might, for example, have a chapel and a chaplain at a camp or in a hospital or at a retirement community.
Sue Lanza:
Okay, yeah.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
That’s what we’re doing in terms of the chaplaincy here. You and I, I should mention, folks, I don’t know if they’ll hear the difference or not, but we’re actually recording this in the chapel today.
Sue Lanza:
I know so there’s some interesting echoes. [crosstalk] if they are ghosts or what they are, but yeah.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
The words I would use to describe what chaplains do that is different from say a parish priest, and we can talk more about some of the other terms that we might be using today, but a chaplain is someone who’s generally available all the time and is present in a particular place. Whereas a parish priest might be going here and there and all kinds of other places, I’m here as a chaplain at The House of the Good Shepherd, I’m here. While I do have other things that I do in terms of ministry and congregations around this area, my primary ministry is here at The House of the Good Shepherd as the chaplain.
Sue Lanza:
It’s not only you just doing services in the chapel. I know when you say you’re here, it means that should someone have a need at an off hour, someone’s actively dying or a family member is in crisis because of something, you’re available to counsel them, talk to them. So it’s really a very special situation for us.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yeah. My position is unusual in some ways, because a little bit like you, I’m just on call all the time.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah. Isn’t it great? You just never have a free second.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
In fact, I think that two of us, our mobile numbers are the only public ones among the-
Sue Lanza:
Yeah, they’re all over the place.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
… residents. Whereas other staff, not necessarily, but they do get called occasionally for things.
Sue Lanza:
What do you attribute or how would you maybe define further? What is the role let’s say here of the chaplain? It obviously would be different in a camp setting or a hospital might be similar, but I’d like to hear more about how you’ve view it.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Right. In terms of work that I do here, again, just to sort of define some of the terms, I’m a priest and I serve in the Episcopal Church as a priest in that particular denomination, which is the denomination that’s founded The House of the Good Shepherd back in the 1880s as we know. My particular role as a priest is to be someone who has a ministry of what we would say is word and sacrament. So preaching, teaching, things like that, and then sacramental ministry. We don’t do baptisms here, much. We do celebrate the Eucharist and we do have occasionally, funeral services and things like that. Those rituals that we do, those are the two particular things in the ministry of a priest, word and sacrament.
Being here, it’s not necessarily a requirement for the chaplain to be a priest. In fact, my predecessor was a deacon who had a different role in terms of within the church. What you can do as a deacon is different from what you can do as a priest. The big difference really being that a priest can celebrate Holy Communion, whereas deacons don’t, typically.
Sue Lanza:
Oh okay. I was curious.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
That’s not part of their work.
Sue Lanza:
I was glad you defined that.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
In terms of my work being a chaplain here, what I would identify as really two things that I would point to is, one is that I’m a person of prayer. That gets expressed in terms of both leading chapel services and on occasion, for example, when we’ve had a gathering in memory of 9/11 last year, my role in that situation was to be the person who led prayers, which I would make a distinction between being a person who leads prayers and being a person of prayer. What I would say is that pretty much anybody can lead prayers, but being a person of prayers, being somebody who’s grounded in that spiritual reality. It’s hard to nail down the words on these things, but being someone who is prayerful in the context of other things, even if I’m not leading a prayer. I would hope, for example, when I’m part of say, a staff meeting or some other kind of thing we do here, just by being present, that I would be thought of in that prayerful sense. Whether I’m actually leading a prayer or not, that’s just part of my presence in that.
The other thing I would say is to support the spiritual lives of those who are here. I want to be pretty clear about this because I don’t assume, and I know for a fact that not everybody here is an Episcopalian.
Sue Lanza:
Correct.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Not everybody here is even a Christian.
Sue Lanza:
That is also correct.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
And not everybody here is necessarily a person of faith of any particular kind. But my job, as I see it in my role as chaplain, is to support people in whatever their spiritual life may be. For some people, that’s very traditional. It’s, “I want to go to chapel services. I want to receive Holy Communion. I want to be part of Bible studies.” That’s wonderful, but there are plenty of folks within the house for whom that is not the way they would define their own spiritual life. We often, those of us in the clergy, talk about folks who are spiritual, but not religious. That’s a phrase that comes up free frequently. If you read publications that churches and clergy read, people who are spiritual but not religious, which is a growing segment of the American population and I’m just aware of that.
The point being that I believe everybody has a spiritual life of some sort, whether they acknowledge it or not, they may or may not be religious. They may not belong to a church. They may not practice their spirituality in a way that looks conventional, the way that we might think of-
Sue Lanza:
Organized in some fashion or part of a group.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yeah, exactly. For my role, to be able to support people in whatever it is that they find meaningful, and I am not here, I should point out, I’m not here as an evangelist. That’s a very different ministry. I am-
Sue Lanza:
That sounds a little scary actually.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, and that word gets used, oh my goodness. That word is handled and mishandled for so long that it’s almost embarrassing, frankly, for the church, but at its heart, evangel means good news. So from that standpoint, I would like to think it’s a word we could maybe be able to reclaim, but I’m not here to try and convert people. When I get called to be with somebody who’s nearing death, my job is not to try and convert them to a particular set of beliefs. That’s not the role, that’s not my job and it would be a violation of my own sense of integrity as a priest, I would say. Unless the person wanted to, and that’s again, I’m supporting that person’s particular spiritual life. That I should point out, we can talk a little more about this, but includes both the residents, but also the staff.
Sue Lanza:
I think that’s been important for people to know that there’s a safe place to have some conversations. I know you and I have had some that are completely off the record. I say they’re under the veil of chaplaincy and you’re probably like, “Oh my gosh, get rid of this lady.”
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, we sometimes in the church, we talk about things are under the stole, which means the stole is that vestment that I wear in a chapel service. Traditionally, it’s what the priest wears when hearing a confession, for example, but there’s an understanding that you can speak to me and I won’t be spreading it around. I sometimes tell people I get paid to keep my mouth shut.
Sue Lanza:
Ah, that’s true. I know a little bit about your background, but I know that the listeners would be interested to hear about your background and that what in your background led you to become a chaplain and eventually come to the house.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I’ve been in some form of parish, pastoral ministry for the last 25 years. Was ordained first in the United Methodist Church and that’s the tradition I grew up in and served in that church for a number of years in a congregation. Then at some point I found myself feeling really drawn into the life of the Episcopal Church and finding that I felt more at home in that. So for the last couple decades I’ve been at this, I’m serving mostly in parishes, congregations through the years, and have really felt called to that work through the years, being in particular congregation at particular time. There have been, I would say three congregations that as I look back that really were the ones that I had a long enough relationship that that’s what my work focused on as a parish priest. Over the years though, I’ve had other experiences in terms of being, say a chaplain at a camp. I’ve also done some ministry in terms of retreats and managing a retreat house nearby here.
In 2020 in February, as you know well, because you were here before me, the chaplain before me retired and you found yourself looking around for a new chaplain and the timing was right for me to be able to come here. Bringing some of that background as a parish priest into this particular place has been a rather interesting journey because it’s required some translation. This is not a parish. There’s a lot that I don’t do that a parish priest would be doing.
Sue Lanza:
Can you give us a for instance?
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Some fundraising for example.
Sue Lanza:
Oh, right. Right.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I don’t tend to do any of that here.
Sue Lanza:
That’s true.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I also, in a parish I would be working with a church counselor, a vestry and that’s not the role here.
Sue Lanza:
That is also true.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I actually have a boss.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah. Ooh.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I sometimes will joke with people that I actually have several bosses. I’ve got my boss here at the house, I’ve also got a bishop, and then of course there’s God who’s in the picture as well.
Sue Lanza:
True. You’re surrounded.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly. The one thing that I would say is probably the closest parallel in my background to the work I do here, is something that most clergy are required to do. It’s called Clinical Pastoral Education. We often refer to it as CPE. That’s one of those acronyms I know but you may not know.
Sue Lanza:
See, I did not know that.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly. Clinical Pastoral education is a program where clergy in training typically spend about three or four months in a hospital setting. So for a three or four months period, I was resident or chaplain intern in a hospital. This was in Washington State where I’m originally from. Learned about, what does it mean to engage people wherever they are spiritually? It’s a really wonderful program that pulls you apart and then puts you back together. There are other examples of those in other professions, but in my case, a CPE Clinical Pastoral Education, really helped me clarify what it is that I bring when I walk into the room of a patient, for example, in a hospital or here at the house, in one of our residence rooms or in a group meeting or something like that.
I’ve had that experience and as you know, I’ve also been surrounded by medical people in my family. The irony of me taking a position in a medical place and then a pandemic hitting six weeks later is not lost on me.
Sue Lanza:
No, definitely not.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I’ve often thought God had a sense of humor in having that happen.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah. I’m so grateful that the timing worked out and you came because we needed you so desperately. We didn’t know, but we did need you.
I’m just curious if I could go back to your piece that you said about your education that you did in Washington State. Can you elaborate a little bit on what some of the things that, you said they pulled you apart and put you back together again. I’m just curious, I’m thinking about when you become an administrator, you have to go through these internships and all this other stuff and it’s grueling because you have to do it while you’re working a full-time job and it’s not fun and it’s not paid and wondered if you could elaborate a little bit so we could understand?
Rev. Shawn Carty:
It’s an interesting process. In my case, I actually chose a place that was both a hospital and a hospice attached to it.
Sue Lanza:
Oh, interesting.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
A residential hospice as well as in-home hospice care. That was intentional on my part. I was very interested in that particular work. I find the whole question of death to be a very interesting one. It’s something I get to be face-to-face with professionally, have experienced personally as well. Both of my parents died before I turned 40, so I’ve had that experience. I think that’s absolutely critical for anybody who does the work that we do here, to be able to face that with some reality.
The thing I would say about clinical pastoral education in terms of how it takes you apart and puts you back together, is that it requires you to look really deep in yourself and ask, who am I and what am I doing here? One of the things that clergy learn very quickly if they’re paying attention, is that when they walk into the room of a hospital patient, let’s just say that for example, I don’t bring medication. I don’t bring any therapeutic surgical technique. I don’t bring anything that’s going to fix anything.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah. You don’t have answers necessarily of some sort.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly. Well, I might have some inklings of what somebody might be dealing with, but I’m not there to fix things. It’s really, to go back to a word I think I used earlier, but to be present and to be able to say to someone, “You’re not alone in this situation. I’m here,” but also depending on the person, “God is present in this particular situation.” Learning how to face things like that without always reaching for some sort of fix and that’s where, for example as I say, I don’t come from the medical side of it, so I don’t necessarily come in with a clinical perspective. I come in from a spiritual side and say, “Okay, what are the resources here to this person spiritually that will help them face whatever it is that they’re facing? Can I encourage them in a direction where they know that they’ve got those resources and can draw upon them.” As opposed to I come in with my tool bag and I’m going to fix things. That’s a very different perspective on it.
I also learned, and I found this throughout the years, but I’ve also learned that sometimes people make assumptions about chaplains. One of which is that if there’s a patient that everybody can’t figure out what to do with, they call the chaplain.
Sue Lanza:
Oh my gosh. Usually they call the administrator too. So just so you know, I get that call too.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
You get those calls too, but it’s like, “Yeah, we can’t fix this situation. So who could?”
Sue Lanza:
Maybe God will help us.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Maybe. Yeah. Maybe I will say that it is an absolute privilege to be present with people in whatever part of their life. If they’re facing challenges or joyful moments too. It’s a very different perspective. Again, I don’t come in to fix things. I am there to be a companion, to be a present to the person, to encourage them to be able to see clearly, sometimes that is helpful. You and I had this conversation elsewhere, but one of the things we sometimes talk about is steering towards the pain.
Sue Lanza:
Right. Yes.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
So many of us, this is a distinctly American thing, we want everything to be sunshine and flowers and that is just not the way life is.
Sue Lanza:
No, it’s not at all. You do have to face some of your demons in order to heal yourself or grow to a next level within your own spirituality or just your general growth as a human being. In order to do that, you have to really take some hard looks at yourself and it’s not pleasant.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yeah. I might recommend at this point a podcast I could recommend.
Sue Lanza:
Oh my.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
It’s called Everything Happens.
Sue Lanza:
Everything happens.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
It’s a young woman named Kate Bowler who teaches at Duke University and is a historian, teaches in the seminary there as well. She wrote a book titled Everything Happens. If you look at the book, the cover, it says Everything Happens for a Reason and then the words, for a reason, are all scratched out.
Sue Lanza:
Ah.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
And-
Sue Lanza:
I love that.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
… she’s also got a more recent book titled There’s No Cure for Being Human, but her podcast, Everything Happens, is well worth listening to. At a very young age, I think in her thirties with a young child, was diagnosed with cancer. A severe, scary kind of cancer. I think chronic as well. So it’s something she’s been dealing with, but what she faced in the midst of all of that, and I shouldn’t speak for her, but would encourage people to find her podcast is that, no amount of positive thinking was going to overcome any of that. Her desire in her books, in her podcasts, in conversations that she has is to be as honest as possible to say, “Yeah, this stinks, but there are some other things to pay attention to here and to be really honest about that.” I find that refreshing because so much of, particularly American culture, is very cheerful and positive and…
Sue Lanza:
Right.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
No, sometimes that’s just not the way life is.
Sue Lanza:
No. Especially not when you’re coming and counseling people when they’re maybe on their deathbed or facing some other challenge, like you mentioned earlier about being present for someone and sometimes that just means sitting there in silence. I know silence makes us very uncomfortable, many of us, but sometimes it’s so powerful to have somebody just sit there with you. It really is. Thanks for that. That was a good, little diversion that we took there.
Tell us about how you actually support the spiritual lives of our residents, which, I see you doing this all the time, but give me all the ways or many of the ways that you do that.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Some of it is very conventional. We have chapel services, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. That’s a lot of chapel services.
Sue Lanza:
It’s a lot.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
We have a couple of Bible studies that happen, so much of it’s very conventional and I enjoy those very much. The other parts though, are very informal. They’re residents that will catch me in the hall and they’ll ask me question or two and then we might have a longer conversation elsewhere. Sometimes, it’s at those critical, we would call, threshold moments.
Sue Lanza:
Yes. That’s a good way to put it.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Somebody who’s coming into the community of The House of the Good Shepherd or potentially dying or the death of a spouse or the death of a child even, those kinds of things, those threshold moments. We sometimes talk about this, there’s a phrase called liminal space. You’re in that place between here and there and like a threshold on a door, like I was saying, you’re not exactly in the room, but you’re not exactly out of it and how do you navigate in those moments? I think that’s one way I try to support folks and residents in their spiritual lives with that.
I think also just being present. One of the things I know from my own work is that I’m one of the handful of people that residents know I have time for, to talk to. That’s my job.
Sue Lanza:
Right. They do know that. Yeah.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Whereas somebody who’s working in the kitchen or in maintenance, I will say that we have, staff here is fantastic. They will take time to talk with residents.
Sue Lanza:
Sure. Oh, I’ve seen it all the time.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
That’s my job. Whereas if your job is to get dinner on the plate, into the dining room, you may not have the time to talk at at the moment and maybe you do it later. But my job generally is to be present and be available for people. I think that’s a big part of it.
I also find, in terms of residents, being supportive for their families as well. You and I have talked a number of times about how COVID has been very different in all of our lives. But for me in particular, one of the things in the two years I’ve been here, I’ve only had occasion to lead a memorial service three times.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah. I know. I found that so interesting when you pointed that out.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Because we just haven’t been gathering the way that we would normally. I would’ve expected probably to do that every month [crosstalk]
Sue Lanza:
That many every month. Yeah.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Every month, if we were in normal times. The other thing is that not one of those has happened actually in the chapel. They’ve always been [crosstalk]
Sue Lanza:
That is so strange.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
We did one outside, we’ve done a couple offsite.
Sue Lanza:
There was one upstairs that you led for, it was about a staff member.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly. There are different things that our situation in COVID have made it very hard. We do what we can, and I’ve learned to be able to lead a chapel service with absolutely nobody else in the chapel. [crosstalk]
Sue Lanza:
I know. That’s become one of your talents right.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
… on TV. I will say though, that I do have somebody sometimes in the chapel with me and that’s my dog, Ranger, who frequently will wander about the chapel and [crosstalk].
Sue Lanza:
Say, “What’s happening here?”
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly. He’ll hear some sound in the hallway and go investigate that and then be back and fall asleep in front of the altar while I’m preaching the sermon or something. But those are all ways that I support the residents. I think just being present to them and being available.
Sue Lanza:
Oh, yeah. The availability is huge. Some of the things that you didn’t mention that maybe are unique just to you as chaplain, there’s some of your creative skills that have nothing to do with chaplaincy or spiritual work necessarily. Although all creative endeavors have a spiritual side to them, I would say.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Absolutely. Yes.
Sue Lanza:
But you put together our newsletter. We try to give you things to put in it, but I know you have to somehow cram it together. For having it available especially when we would look at some of those newsletter, I was going to say episodes, but newsletter additions. And we would Marvel at the fact that we felt like we were locked down here in prison during some of the dark days of COVID. But in reality, when you look at that newsletter, it’s showing a completely different side, like there is life here, we’re doing lots of things despite everything. So for that, I’m very grateful.
I also know that you have a literary bug and you love words and you love quoting and you give us for our morning meeting, now we have a zoom call with all of our administrative staff and you always help us by ending it with a quote every day. It’s so nice have that because you usually try to fit it around something that’s happened or just sometimes it’s a day when everybody’s down and you help lift us up. The other thing that you do is, back to the literary piece, is that you help by having some reading of books together, a book club group, TV, and also in person, it’s just expanded the activities that we have here and it’s appreciated.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, I’m glad to hear that. I will say one of the things, and this was a delightful discovery for me, but because of COVID and because we’ve not been able to gather in groups, one of the things, early on we decided was that we’d use the chapel camera and TV channel as best we could. One of the things that I came up with was just reading to the residents. So we’ve read a number of different books. We read A Christmas Carol year last year, just before Christmas. I’ve read, in some cases children’s books, I’ve just finished reading, Winnie-the-Pooh, which is a delightful book. And as the residents here know, I believe that children’s books are not just for children. There’s plenty for us [crosstalk] to get out of them. The other book that we just finished reading not too long ago was All Creatures Great and Small, but-
Sue Lanza:
Oh, it’s another great book. Oh my gosh. I almost can’t watch that when it’s on TV. Because, because some of it is just too sad with the animals.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I know.
Sue Lanza:
I know I’m such a mush with those animals. I know. And it’s like, I would love to watch it and I love the heartwarming parts, but please no animals that are getting upset with anything. So crazy.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
But just reading to the residents has been, I didn’t expect it. I really enjoyed it. I know that not all residents tune in, obviously, but the few that do, I do hear from them and they say, “I really enjoyed it.” I have to be careful sometimes when I’m picking books for that, because I’ve tried picking a couple books that were humorous, I just got laughing so hard I couldn’t read. Then it defeats the purpose, but at least it’s entertaining.
Sue Lanza:
It entertaining for sure. Well, that’s what you do for our residents, but there’s this whole other side, the fact that we’re lucky enough to have a full-time chaplain here. Like I said, we’ve needed you during these last two years. You picked a great two years to come. I really appreciate your forethought. But tell us some of the stuff that you have done for the staff. I can speak for myself, knowing that you’ve been someone that’s listened to me and when I have other people that I really can’t share some of these things with. And you’ve been there to help me through some challenging times, so I appreciate that.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, we’ve all been through some challenging times the last two years, no doubt. I think one of the things that I’ve discovered being here, I didn’t expect it, but that my work here would include the staff. I don’t know why I didn’t expect that, I should have, but just learning that there are, it’s just some wonderful staff here. I just have to say that there are staff here who give and give and give, deeply care about our residents.
Sue Lanza:
Without a doubt. We’ve talked in other podcasts, how people go to the Nth degree to please our residents. Some of them have family, some of them don’t, it doesn’t matter. They’re there to try to give them whatever the little moment that they need right then and there. We’re not just talking about hugs, we’re talking about special things that they do that are just a little bit above and beyond taking that extra second to do it. I guess that’s probably what you’re talking about too.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
It is. And just, so wanting to support the staff in that work because I have to be careful how I say this, but this is not a particular work area that is highly paid. I think unfortunately our society doesn’t value the work of caring for our seniors, as much as it should. Let me say that, but that I can be supportive, encouraging those who are working here and doing really remarkable work in so many different ways. I also think one thing that people may or may not know is that we staff really take it to heart when, for example, one of our residents dies. That is a stress that it doesn’t show up on any chart [crosstalk]
Sue Lanza:
No, no. There’s no chart for that.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
So trying to be encouraging for people as they face those difficult things, but also in some very happy moments too. We’ve had a couple births here, children of staff.
Sue Lanza:
Not here, not in the building.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Not in the building. Right. But celebrating those and being able to delight in the joy of that. And as you mentioned, I’ve been doing the thought for the day, at the end of our morning meetings. And I’ve got a whole collection of quotes now.
Sue Lanza:
You sure do. You can trot them out.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly.
Sue Lanza:
You can recycle them, we won’t notice.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I do that with sermons maybe occasionally too, but trying to be present in that way for staff. One of the things I remember experiencing in my work as a parish priest was very often, it was hard to track down parishioners and just have a cup of coffee. People are unbelievably busy in this world that we live in. Here, because I’m just here and I happen to bump into people, a quick, “How are you doing today?” “Well…” And just you know, in the tone of the voice-
Sue Lanza:
Right. You know right away that you need a little intervention.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
They’re carrying something heavy and need perhaps to talk a little bit about that. It may only be a three-minute conversation in, but I’d like to think it helps out for our staff, just knowing that they’re being supported in their work. And that’s interesting. I’ve noticed, maybe just because I’m looking for it a little bit more in my reading, but chaplains are coming up in different places that you might not expect. So for example, corporations, in sometimes, are now in playing chaplains.
Sue Lanza:
That’s a great idea.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yeah. They realize that there’s a value to have somebody around who can talk and engage in those things that are not necessarily… The militaries had chaplains for a very long time.
Sue Lanza:
That’s true. You’re right. You’re right.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Because when you’re on a ship in the middle of the sea, you need a Naval chaplain to be there and be able to speak to whatever the spiritual concerns are of those folks who are deployed in that.
Sue Lanza:
Funny that you say that about having a chaplain in those situations for someone to talk to, like even in a corporation. I’ve often thought, and I’m sure somebody will say, “Oh brother.” I’ve often thought we should have a psychologist on staff in a larger place, just so there’s a safe to go. HR human resources sometimes fills that role or sometimes our social worker or you fill that role as a chaplain. Sometimes I do as an administrator, but everybody needs that place that’s safe to go to. I know my daughter will tell me this a lot. She’ll say, “Mom, this is one of those times when you’re not supposed to try to fix it or tell me anything. You just sit and listen. Say, ‘Oh, okay honey. Thanks for…'” “Maybe you could tell me at the beginning of the conversation, give me a wave or something.”
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Isn’t it wonderful when our children have that wisdom?
Sue Lanza:
Oh, they are just great. But I really feel it’s important that people have some place that’s a safe place that they know that they can go and just vent for three minutes or whatever it is and feel comfortable that information is safe and not going anywhere.
What do you see as the future here of chaplaincy? I’m sure you’ve looked around, we’ve talked, let’s say, in terms of some of the things that chaplain needs, like we want to have a better sound system. Who knew we needed even a better TV system and stuff, but I’m not even talking about the physicality of it. What do you see for the future for us here?
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, I think it’s probably important for us to acknowledge that it’s unusual for a place like this to have a full-time chaplain. So I give a lot of it to you and to the board and others who have supported that, because I do think there’s a value to the work.
Sue Lanza:
Definitely. It’s paid off in spades and especially during this critical time.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yeah. And again, it’s one of those things that doesn’t necessarily show up on some balance sheet someplace, but I think there’s a quality to the place that is special. We talk about that all the time, but I’d like to think chaplaincy is part of that. As I look ahead, I can see this work as chaplain being something that continues to grow. I think it would be wonderful, for example, if we were able to do something like what I experienced with that Clinical Pastoral Education. And in fact we do have some volunteers who help, again, COVID has really that. But we do have one volunteer. Her name is Annie and I want to give her credit here. We have continued with our Bible study, which she would’ve come for in person, but we’ve continued doing it over the phone, using a conference call.
Our residents have been troopers with that, trying to navigate, “How do you do this? How do you have a phone call with six or eight people on it?” Annie has been one of those people who’s really helped out. In a sense, she’s almost had an internship here in the work that she’s done. I could see that being something for the future of the chaplaincy here. I definitely think that there’s something to be said about being able to meet in groups when that’s appropriate. I could see, for example, a spirituality group for staff.
Sue Lanza:
Oh, yeah. That’s a good one. Just to talk about, what do you define it as and how does it look to you?
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Exactly. Not necessarily even in the chapel, but to have it in some other place. As you know, this chapel, as we’re sitting in right now, recording this, gets used for a lot of things. Particularly during COVID and particularly during some of the construction and renovations that we’re experiencing just at the moment. So the chapel is a place that’s a hospitable place and I’d like to think that’s part of the chaplaincy work as well.
Sue Lanza:
To have open doors for whatever. So I think the residents in independent living were so surprised when you were opened your doors and said, “It’s okay, you can have your meeting here and you could even have happy hour.” I think they all fell over with that. They thought you were going to have some list of rules you were going to hand out and they were going to be sitting in corners or something. It was just so funny and they were fine. We even had a Christmas Eve, you had services and then we followed right outside with a little gathering and it was really very charming and sweet. It was very nice. The more we can look to use the chapel for other things, it brings everybody back together.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Yeah, it does. And I think you also know that there’s a role that I hear here that transcends to us being in one department, that’s an incredibly important perspective that the chaplain has. I’m a department of one as, as you know, we’ve talked about that, but I am not somebody who only focuses on a particular area of the house. I focus on the whole place. As chaplain, I get to be connected with skilled nursing residents and with independent living residents, with staff, with families, everybody, the board even. And [crosstalk]
Sue Lanza:
… You give the prayer at our board meetings and you’ve talked to the board, you know some of the board members who are Episcopalian clergy. And you even, I forgot to mention some other important thing that people don’t know about you. You have taken undue your wing, various plants that are half dead. Some of them are a little scary looking honestly, and I’m a plant lady, but wow. I don’t know what you’re doing in here.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
Well, yeah. The chapel has become a hospital for house plants [crosstalk] number of times people have said to me, “Oh, I’ve got this house plant, but I just can’t keep it alive.” I’m like, “Okay. I’ll take it.”
Sue Lanza:
“All right. We’ll take in.”
Rev. Shawn Carty:
So it’s become of a little bit of an orphanage of plants, the chapel, so there’s a lot of that happens.
Sue Lanza:
Yeah, but that’s good. That’s another welcoming piece for you.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
The other thing I might just add in terms of the future of the chaplaincy is, and you and I have done a lot of work on this and including several podcasts, is about the history of this place.
Sue Lanza:
Oh no. I love the history of this place.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
There’s a writer named Kathleen Norris, who, in one of her books, she says that the church doesn’t think in terms of months or years or even decades, we think in terms of centuries and millennia.
Sue Lanza:
Oh dear.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
So for us, history is just part of who we are. And as you know, from our previous conversations and podcasts, that the history of this place and its roots and the Episcopal Church and yes, I’m an Episcopal priest. And I hope that connection will long be celebrated and continued, because I think that it’s in the DNA of this place, whether or not any of our residents are Episcopalians as it is, there’s some, but not a whole lot.
Sue Lanza:
Not a whole lot.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
But being able to engage people with some of that history and make sure that they know our past.
Sue Lanza:
Definitely. Well, Shawn, any closing thoughts because you’ve given us a lot to think about here and I learned a lot.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
I don’t know that I have anything more to add. I think I’ve [crosstalk]
Sue Lanza:
That’s okay. That’s okay.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
… said most of what I can say.
Sue Lanza:
All right. Well, thank you so much. I’m Sue.
Rev. Shawn Carty:
And I’m Shawn.
Sue Lanza:
And we want to thank you for joining us for another episode of House Guests. See you next time. Thank you.
Thanks for listening to this episode of House Guests. The Podcast which is dedicated to all great things about The House of the Good Shepherd, a retirement community in Hackettstown, New Jersey. To learn more about us, please visit our website hotgs.org. Thanks for listening. See you next time.