A Day in the Life of a Chaplain

It was last Friday, as my daily routine met me at 4:00am (coffee, meditation coupled with reading & prayer, the financial news on TV, my cat Rafiki jumping on my lap for a morning massage and a cardio workout at Fitness Works...), when I had a hunch, you know an intuition, that this day, Friday the 16th, was going to be a day marked with memories. 

My typical work day on Friday starts with office hours from 8 to 11 where I usually host two or three counseling sessions at Rock Harbor Christian Fellowship.  This office day was routine, encouraging my congregants that with proper Biblical thinking and application, with that 'I can with Him attitude', they would be okay; phone calls, follow up emails and admin type of work marked my morning.  The memories, though, began to pile up around 10:30 when Mary brought over a car full of jackets, scarf's, gloves and sweaters.  You see, the Rotary Club of Morro Bay lives their motto and last Friday they put others above self as they blessed our Citizen's of Morro Bay (our homeless friends) with these timely necessities of life.  Wow - all the goodies from the club literally covered an eight foot table in the lobby at the church.

Well, around 11, I journeyed over to the Morro Bay Police Department, had lunch with my buddy Hannibal and participated in a briefing session with the other officer's.  Before I knew it, Richard & I were in his squad car cruising the streets of Morro Bay - looking for the bad guys and offering a helping hand to those in need.  The afternoon brought a few police calls, some report writing for Richard and a citizen follow up to provide police information.  We drove back to the church and gathered all the tokens of love Mary brought from Rotary.

Amanda and me

At 4:00 in the afternoon, Hannibal and I drove over to Morro Bay's Domino's to buy pizza for our friends at the park, you know the Citizen's!  As we walked into the shop, Oliver, the store manager, met us and provided free soda & free deserts.  We were ecstatic, knowing the pizza was going to be a great treat for the gang.  We arrived about 5 and we welcomed like we were heroes; seriously, any preconceived ideas you may have about homeless folks, if you were with us, they would be eliminated.  These friends are so nice, so thankful and simply, so gracious - you'd be amazed!  As we prayed and they began to eat, another memory showed up: Amanda and her two children.  Amanda is a fine member from the Rotary Club and she came with more goodies to pass out: bags of toiletries, toothpaste, toothbrushes, deodorant, hand wipes, etc.  Oh, the gang was so happy.  And then, another blessing came, another memory in the person of Elaine.  She, with her husband and two other angels brought Christmas presents for our homeless family; presents that brought not only tears to my eyes, but tears to the eyes of many our of homeless folk.

Jamie, Jacob and Elaine

Needless to say, Richard and I drove away from Lila Kaiser Park in Morro Bay on Cloud Nine; we were literally blown away with the magnanimous hearts of so many who stepped out of themselves to simply say, in a tangible way, that these homeless friends really matter!  Thank You to Rock Harbor for blessing the family with Pizza; Thank You to Domino's for the soda and desert; Thank You to the Morro Bay Rotary Club for the wonderful clothing and necessities to make it through the cold winter; and, Thank You to Elaine and her family for bringing the joy of Christmas to a group of people that so many in society treat as outcasts - for at least one night, the Citizen's of Morro Bay were treated with decency, respect and love...treated in a way that was simply what my favorite Rabbi said, "Do unto others as you would have done unto you!"

Well, my day was about over when I arrived home, prepared a salad and began to enjoy dinner with my gal.  We prayed, began to eat and share how our respective day went.  Oh about half way through our meal, I received a call from dispatch that there was an 1144 (police language for a death) and if possible, could I go over to the house and provide comfort.  I immediately told Pat yes and drove over to the home.  I arrived at the home, walked in and introduced myself.  After long hugs with the widow and the son, we held hands and asked God to bring peace & comfort to this very sad family.  We hugged again, I promised to follow up with a phone call the next day and committed to be available for further care & counseling if needed. 

As I retired for the evening, being thoroughly exhausted, I had to thank my Creator for an amazing day that in my opinion, I was able to taste a bit of what heaven must be like: caring, giving, benevolence and of course, unconditional love.  In fact, I felt that I was doing exactly what I was created to do; namely, invest my life into others!  And, this was all A Day in the Life of a Chaplain!

Have a great day and thanks for reading...