I just finished today's chemo. Here is a brief update:
The chemo treatment today (Thursday) went off without a hitch. The blood counts were sufficient for us to move forward. I also received an injection of Procrit to stimulate red blood cell production. Tomorrow I receive a similar injection to stimulate my white blood cell production. Today's treatment was the last of round two. I have next week off and, if I regain some of my strength, I plan to schedule the celiac plexus ablation.
These have been difficult days. No appetite, along with feelings of weakness and nausea, sap life of its zest. But I keep moving forward, day by day, and God supplies the strength to do so. I continue to receive assurances of your love and prayers and these are what keep me going.
During this Holy Week, I find myself at Gethsemane. I've tried to express what that means for me in a new posting of Along the Journey. As we move toward Easter, remember that without the cross, there is no crown; without death, there is no life.
Jack
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3 comments:
Jack--
Your postings during this 2007 Triduum commemoration of our Lord's passion, death, and resurrection leave this old Catholic priest in awe and wonder at the Mystery of which your life has become such a riveting prism.
I don't think I will ever walk through these days quite "the same man" again... and still you write, and chug on!
I am preparing to bury a former student who was taken from us much more quickly -- a bump pn the head in late January, an exotic infection, weeks in the hospital, ten days in hospice care, and ultimately death last Wednesdat April 4. His wonderful family walked him every step of his own journey, and the two of you (Jack and my friend Andy) have been at the forefront of my approach to Holy Thursday, Good Friday, the great Easter Vigil.
Jack knows that I have very, VERY few unpublished thoughts, and while my student / friend / brother disciple was occupying my day-in, day-out, Jack and Anita have been with me as well in these last days. The result is the Pastor Letter below, for the Easter Sunday bulletin of St. Anastasia Church in St Augustine, FL. No small part of the genesis of this, Jack, was your wonderful "this I know" essay a couple of weeks ago.
Settle in. Though Lent may be over, it's time for one more lick of penance, viz.:
Pastor Letter for April 8, 2007 (Easter Sunday)
Dear Friends:
As I write this – ten days before Easter -- I am making almost daily visits to see a former student, 45-years-young, who is dying before our eyes of one of those exotic infections that even medicine’s best antibiotics cannot cure. As you read this, my friend may still be in his hospice bed surrounded by his family. More than likely, though, he is in the loving arms of our heavenly Father, swept up by the power of the Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, the “firstborn of the dead” (Colossians 1:18).
My friend knows in ways we cannot even imagine the reality of Easter. More than flowers. More than ceremony. More than theology. More than the New Age superficies of reincarnation. So much more. He has seen and has heard what “eye has not seen and ear has not heard, what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9-10).
And yet still he waits for more. He awaits the resurrection of the body. Just as we do. Sunday after Sunday, we stand and witness our waiting as we conclude the Profession of Faith: “We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen!” Today, as we renew our Baptismal Promises, we are even more explicit. We profess that we believe in “the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting.”
What a daring – or foolish! – hope! To much of the world, even parts the Christian world, Christ’s resurrection was some kind of wishful thinking on behalf of the disciples, as if somehow Christ’s memory and his inspiration remained with them and energized them and that was it. And to so many people in our own world, the language of resurrection and immortality, though widely in use, has the same vapid emptiness. For them, it’s simply language to express that our loved one is departed and is “in another existence.”
That is not what we believe about Christ’s resurrection, or our own. We believe that Christ’s resurrection – his bodily resurrection – turned the order of nature upside down. And that, in the end, the whole cosmos will be consumed by the power of the “Life explosion” that began on Easter morning: “But now, Christ has been raised from the dead,” St. Paul words it, “ the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20). Christ’s bodily resurrection will ultimately be shared with us as our own bodily resurrection.
While we are alive on this earth, we respect our bodies, we care for our bodies, because they are Temples of the Holy Spirit. And after we have breathed our last mortal breaths, we still show special respect for our bodies – in our rites of farewell, in our preserving of the remains of our loved ones -- as a witness to the world that we are waiting: we await the resurrection of the body, and life everlasting. Cemeteries are such an integral part of “the back yard” of many churches for that reason. Our own beautiful columbaria, containing the mortal remains of the members of our parish who have “gone before us marked with the sign of faith” and who await the resurrection of the body, are a powerful witness to every person who visits these holy grounds at St. Anastasia parish.
I hope that you will take a few moments on this Easter Sunday to read, prayerfully, the little flier prepared by our Florida Catholic bishops on some practical questions regarding funerals, cremation, and our profession of our Easter faith.
Even as my friend has been growing weaker and has been visibly fading by the day, his grip – when we say hello, when we say goodbye – is like a vice. He looks at me very intently as he grips my hand as if to say, “I’m not a disembodied spirit, Father. I’m still me, the whole me, body-and-soul me.” He is as ready to die as any man I have ever met. But he is not ready to give up the core of his faith by flaking off into some “spirit world.” He awaits the resurrection of his body. He awaits the resurrection of his body, and life everlasting. Amen!
Love, Father Morgan
A musician was performing a solo recital in Singapore. When he ended the last selection, thunderous applause and a response came from the audience, "Play it again!" He stepped forward, bowed and said "What a wonderful touching and moving response. Of course I shall be delighted to play it again." And he did. At the end of the recital, again there were the loud applause and many cries of "Play it again!" This time, the musician went forward to the edge of the stage and smiled, saying, "Thank you very much. I have never seen so much appreciation for my work. I would love to stay and play again but there is no time. I have to be in Kuala Lumpur later and so farewell." The crowd became silent and then someone from the back of the stage said loudly, "You are not going anywhere and you will stay and play it again until you get it right!"
Cheer up, Jack. The doctor will get it right sooner and you'll be back in Singapore!
Thank you for sharing this part of your difficult journey with all of us. It enriches us deeply. Our prayers continue.
Joyce & Tom Cleary, Tampa, Florida
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