Beeson Podcast, Episode 504 Cecelia Walker July 7, 2020 >>Announcer: Welcome to the Beeson podcast, coming to you from Beeson Divinity School on the campus of Samford University. Now your hosts, Doug Sweeney and Kristen Padilla. >>Doug Sweeney: Welcome to the Beeson podcast. I�m Doug Sweeney, here with my co-host Kristen Padilla. We are once again coming to you from multiple locations as we all shelter in place here in Birmingham. We pray that you are safe, healthy, and finding joy in the Lord, even during this awful pandemic. Today�s guest is a person I�m hearing more and more about these days as Christians in our region [inaudible 00:00:53] suffering through this crisis. She�s a Beeson alumni and a leading hospital chaplain the Birmingham area. Thanks to generous support from some friends of our divinity school, Beeson is making chaplaincy an even greater priority in the months and years ahead, which is one reason why we wanted to have this person on our show today. Kristen, would you please introduce today�s guest, the Reverend Cecilia Walker, to our audience? >>Kristen Padilla: I will be glad to. Hello, everyone. We have the Reverend Dr. Cecilia Walker. She is the Executive Director of Chaplaincy and Clinical Pastoral Education at Brookwood Baptist Health System. She is also an Associate Minister at Greater Shiloh Baptist Church here in the Birmingham area. As Doug has already said, she is one of our wonderful Beeson alumni who we are so proud of. It is great to have you on the show today. Welcome, Reverend Walker. >>Cecilia Walker: Thank you. It�s great to be here. >>Kristen Padilla: We�d like to begin these conversations getting to know you better, Cecelia. So, could you tell us a little bit about yourself? Who are you? How did you come to faith in Jesus Christ? >>Cecilia Walker: Yes, I�m the daughter of Walter Cecil and Annie Laura Walker. Both of my grandfathers were Baptist ministers and almost all of my uncles on both sides of the family. I�m married to Roy Ambrose Jr., and I have two children who are with the Lord, Jeffrey and Gabrielle. I grew up in Birmingham, Alabama. In fact, I grew up two blocks down from Dynamite Hill, which is in the Smithville area. And it�s called that because during the Civil Rights struggle Dr. Martin Luther King used to stay there with some of the residents. So, I grew up in the midst of that climate. I don�t remember a time in my life that I haven�t loved Jesus. I�ve been hearing about him all my life. My mother loved to say that I was born on Monday night and then the next Sunday I was at church. I�ve loved being in church and being a part of everything that happens in church. My family introduced me to Christ early on and I just always believed that he loved me. I always loved him. When I was nine years old I made a public profession of faith before the church and was baptized. Then I started doing everything I could to be a part of the church. Other than my family, Christ is the longest relationship that I�ve had with anyone. And I just love that. >>Doug Sweeney: Cecilia, I bet a lot of our listeners would be interested to learn how it is you became a hospital chaplain. When you came to Beeson to enroll as an M. Div. student did you have hospital chaplaincy in mind, or is that something that the Lord showed you he had for you more gradually? >>Cecelia Walker: Yeah, it was actually more gradual. When I was called to ministry I was really tracking to get to my lifetime dream. As a child I loved reading. In fact, I would be at the library literally all day in the summer. The librarians would have to call out to me to find me in the stacks to close. So, I started working for the Avondale Library at that time. I was working to get ready to go for my master�s in Library Science and God called me into ministry. I had a conversation with him. I reminded him I�m Baptist and I�m a woman and I�m not understanding this. I had planned to be the librarian at the Smithville library, which is the library where I grew up at. Then to be the Director of Birmingham Library Systems. So, you know, that�s where I was headed. But when he called me into ministry and he insisted that he wanted me trained, I thought, okay, I don�t even know anything about seminary. It wasn�t even on my focus, because I really didn�t think, as a woman, that there would be a place for me in ministry. But I applied to Beeson after doing some research and found out that that was here, and didn�t expect to get accepted, but I got accepted. Then I thought, okay, I work full time at the library, they are not going to let me go to Beeson during the day. But I�ll go ask. And I asked, could I be off four days during the week and come in the afternoon and work the weekends? My supervisor, without any hesitation, said, �Yes.� And so I thought, okay. And Dean Joy, when I came to Beeson, he said, �What are you going to do?� I said, I have no idea. None. I�m just here because I know God has called me. But as I continued to go to school and I started nearing the end I remember two very sad days in my life. One day was the day that my father died. He died at Cooper Green Hospital and my mother and I went to see him, and he was tossed in this room, uncovered, in the same agonizing pose that he had died in. A couple of years later my husband died. He died and was at St. Vincent�s Hospital. The chaplain came and asked me, would I like to go see him? And I said, no, thinking and remembering my father�s situation. But he said, �No, let�s try. I�ll go with you.� Jeffrey was in the room, in a bed, in his clothes, covered, and looked so peaceful. And it was a way for me to say goodbye in a way that I wouldn�t have had otherwise. So, as I was ending up my time at Beeson and I had been hearing about others taking CPE I really didn�t even know where to begin. So, I called that chaplain and he helped me to understand the process of getting started, and that�s where it began. >>Kristen Padilla: That�s beautiful, Cecelia. I love hearing about your journey. As you said, you didn�t really know where to begin and not much thought about what all was involved in hospital chaplaincy. I would gauge that there are probably some listening today who know that hospitals have chaplains, but don�t know what all is involved with that ministry. Could you tell us about the ministry of hospital chaplains and why chaplains are essential to the work of hospitals? >>Cecelia Walker: Sure. When I started I had no idea. Even when I took my first unit of CPE I had by that time completed my Master of Divinity. But once I started working in the hospital I realized that there�s a lot that goes into it. I thought that I was coming to the hospital to learn how to take care of the patient. One of the first things you�re going to learn is about yourself. About your limitations and your vulnerabilities. But then the ministry develops into doing spiritual assessment so that we learn how to join people wherever they are. We�re not trying to pull people past their grief. We�re trying to be with them where they are. Some people are at different phases when persons may die. So, we learn how to just be present. We learn how to have empathic listening. How to create a safe space for them to just be themselves, whatever that is. To be compassionate. To not have an agenda. The patient, the staff person, the family member sets the agenda. No judgment, none. Even though I am Christian, I encounter people who are not Christian. There�s no judgment with that. I�ve worked with people who have committed crimes � no judgment. I�m just there to be support to them. Chaplains are essential to the work in the hospital because we�re clinically trained. We are on staff. We are ministers, but we�re clinically trained to come alongside people and offer spiritual support in times of distress, but also in times of celebration. Because people do have babies in the hospital. People have times where the prognosis isn�t as bad as they thought it was going to be and we�re able to celebrate with them. Because we are on staff at the hospital we are able to go into places that the pastor or other clergy can�t go. And chaplains have been requested to go into the rooms with women who are having babies. We go into surgeries upon request. With burn patients when they�re being re-bandaged ... and I�ve even sang to them and prayed with them during that time, because it�s very, very painful. In trauma rooms, we�re in the trauma room with people who have been in accidents or been shot or stabbed. All of those situations that a regular minister would not be able to be, and we�ve been trained to be there so we don�t pass out when we see the blood and the things that we have to endure. Also, we sit at the besides of people transitioning from this life to eternity. We�re supportive of our doctors and nurses, because sometimes the work gets hard for them, and we�re right there able to be present for them and help them when they give that news. And the list just keeps going on. Chaplains can stay with patients much longer than a doctor or a nurse can stay. We can stay there while they cry, while they share their stories. And we advocate for patients. Sometimes we even assist them in asking questions to get clarity about their diagnosis or the procedure. We help them to ask questions when they don�t understand. >>Doug Sweeney: Kristen and I know well that you�re not only a chaplain yourself, but you oversee the training of lots of other hospital chaplains. You�ve overseen the training of some Beeson students who wanted to become hospital chaplains. We wanted to ask you what�s exciting about that for you? What do you like about the supervisory educational part of your ministry? I bet some of our listeners would also appreciate hearing from you about what it is you�re looking for in terms of in future hospital chaplains? >>Cecelia Walker: When I first took that first unit of CPE and I encountered the CPE educators and supervisors I said, that is not what I want to do. I�ve learned don�t tell God what you don�t want to do. Because I just didn�t want to be a supervisor. I just wanted to go on the floor and see the patients. But it was so life affirming for me. I became more self aware than I�ve ever been. More accepting of myself. I�ve been singing Amazing Grace all my life and it was the first time that I really understood what offering grace to myself was like. Once I learned how to accept myself better, to be more aware of myself, to offer myself grace, I was more gracious to people that I encountered. So, that�s the thing, I wanted what I caught ... to teach that to somebody else or to journey with them or to see that sense of discovery of, �Man, God can use me in this one on one situation.� Because many of us think about preaching to the masses. But this one on one, one person at a time, as a chaplain, but now as an educator � one student at a time. To see them flourish and grow and become more aware of the things that they can do. There are many things that I want to pass on to them, but I want them to learn to accept themselves and to use the gifts that God has given them wherever they are, with whomever they encounter. Now, in order to be a chaplain a person needs to be able to create a nonjudgmental space, to be open, to be curious. When they�re first starting that�s what I�m looking for, somebody who�s teachable. And that doesn�t mean that it�s a perfect situation, that you�re totally open or totally teachable, because when I came into CPE I thought I knew this and that. But the patients began to stretch me. So, to be able to be willing to be stretched. To recognize that I don�t have all of the answers and that�s okay. Someone who is willing to just learn. When we come into CPE we don�t even know what we don�t know. So, I�m looking for somebody who�s vulnerable and willing to be humble and has a sense of humility and who truly loves God�s people. Just loves God�s people. Somebody who�s willing to be uncomfortable, because CPE is very uncomfortable. And seeing people suffer is uncomfortable. And that can be moved. People who are moved by somebody else�s pain. >>Kristen Padilla: We just finished a three week series on the podcast on our Beeson magazine them �Being Human.� You actually were interviewed for that issue. So, we encourage the listeners, if they haven�t checked it out already, to look at the magazine site and read your interview. But in the interview that you gave, you shared how John 1:14 and Philippians 2:5 have shaped the way you think about what it means to be human and how to respect another�s humanity in your line of work. So, I wonder if you could talk about that. How have these verses shaped the ministry you do as a chaplain? >>Cecelia Walker: Yeah. John 1:14, so �the Word became human and made his home among us. And he was filled with unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father�s one and only Son.� And then Philippians, �You must have the same attitude that Christ Jesus had.� Those scriptures really inform my ministry because every day I�m trying to be more like Christ and to have the attitude that he had, that he would leave being comfortable and get uncomfortable because he loved me, loved us, so much. And just the whole idea of having the attitude of Christ that this person is important to Jesus. This person is important to God. This person was created in the image of God. That helps me to respect every person. You can imagine that when you�re in the hospital sometimes people are in such agony, it�s not personal about me. It�s just what they�re going through. And they need to be able to be free to be exactly who they are without any pressure for me. I learned that from Jesus. When you just see Jesus interact with people one on one in the scriptures you see him letting them be who they are. And he�s not pulling them in, but we�re drawn to better because of Jesus. So, just that whole idea that he came and he loves us so much that he�s not ... it wasn�t comfortable but he loved us so much that he would insinuate himself into our lives this way. That�s what I want to do, and those scriptures really inform my ministry in that way. >>Doug Sweeney: Some of our people may also remember we interviewed you for an article we published on the web on what it means to be a spiritual first responder on the ministry of hospital chaplains during covid19. So, we thought that this audience might appreciate hearing a little bit from you about what you think some of the unique challenges have been for people in your line of ministry during the coronavirus epidemic. And maybe even a couple of stories about how the Lord has enabled you to minister the gospel in a special way to people at Princeton Medical Center as they�ve suffered under covid19? >>Cecelia Walker: Yeah. Because all of our hospitals are having to limit our personal protective equipment, chaplains have had to learn how to minister in a different way, because normally we�re holding hands and we�re hugging people, and people are crying on our shoulders, literally. But with this epidemic we�ve had to learn to minister from a distance. Even on the other side of a glass window. Some people who can even talk or hear us have to talk to us on the phone, and we minister through the glass. Some people are not able ... we can�t even go into that area, that unit, so we pray at the end of the hall for the staff, and pray for the patients there. Family members are not allowed to come into the hospital on a regular basis. The patient has to be at the end of life or a baby has been born, and then we escort them one at a time. Everybody is masked. Nobody is hugging. Nobody is holding hands. So, it�s taken our ministry to another level, though, because that skill to be able to help somebody to feel that you really get them and feel them without putting your hands on them, without using the normal ways that we communicate that. That�s been a challenge for us, but it�s helped us to grow. We have people who die in the hospital and the families have not been able to be here or come into the hospital, or if they come it�s only one or two people who are able to come. So, one of the things that I�ve been doing and having my staff do is to call and follow up with the families after they�ve returned home. And it�s been amazing how the families will ask, �Can you wait for us to gather everybody,� and we pray with them over the phone. There are patients now ... the restrictions are being relaxed some ... that are being able to come and have surgery, but they�re still by themselves. I�ve spent the last couple of days with a person who was dropped off by her father and she was very afraid. So, I�ve been there with her through the surgery, been with her through these several days, as the pain is subsiding. And been able to communicate with the father to say, �I�ve seen her and yes, she�s walking the halls. She�s doing this.� We�re being their eyes for them. So, that�s been really special. We�ve also had to minister to our staff because our staff gets tired. It�s been really hard and really draining. Long hours away from family. So, our department brings snacks to [inaudible 00:20:28] to eat. So, we bring snacks and foods. The other thing is from Beeson, Dr. Matthews and his wife came by and brought some cards that his wife�s ministry group had hand written. When we handed them out to different staff members and they were just so moved, some to tears � that people were actually praying for them and writing prayers and thinking of them. So, it�s been a new way of offering care with a lot of limitations, but we�ve had to learn how to move those limitations. And reminding people that, yes, your family may not be here physically, but of course they�re praying for you, and that God is with you. That reminder sometimes helps people when they�re having ... their anxiety is really high. That God hasn�t forgotten. God is with you. And that he�s bringing us in there to stand in the gap for the family. >>Kristen Padilla: Cecelia, I can only imagine if I was that family member what a value it would be to know that you or another chaplain was there with my loved one. So, thank you for that ministry that you all are doing at this time, especially. We would like to end the podcast hearing what God has been teaching you on a personal level these days? Is there anything you would like to share with our listeners that would encourage them in their walk with the Lord at all times, but maybe even more specifically at this specific time during a pandemic? >>Cecelia Walker: Yes. All of my life I think my favorite characteristic of God ... I even had a bracelet engraved with �faithful.� That God is faithful. And in the midst of all of this ... we entered this year and it was a good year, we thought. Everything seemed to be going up financially and business and everything was really just rocking along. And then we were shaken to our core. But God is not shaken. I was surprised, but God was not surprised. So, I�ve been just really reminded of the faithfulness, the steadfast love, the unmovable love of God, and I�ve seen it demonstrated in so many ways. When I�m listening to the news on what�s going on over the whole world, and the other hospitals even in our country and how access to very important equipment, ventilators and things, have been not available but God has made that available for us � it�s not because we�re so good, but because he�s so good. Because he�s so faithful. And that we�ve been able to help our patients and be there for them. Even the ones that we�ve lost, for the families to be able to say, �You did the best you could, and I�m glad that you were caring for my loved one.� Just God�s faithfulness. I continue to learn to trust him more and more and that�s a lifetime learning for me. But yeah, I�ve seen his faithfulness and that experience ... that�s one of the things that CPE talks about a lot, is experiential learning. And this pandemic has thrown us all into this experience and on the other side of it I hope that we don�t forget these lessons of how God has been faithful. >>Doug Sweeney: That is a wonderful Christian truth, but on the other hand in a season like this one that we live into more and more deeply, understand the profundity of more and more, all the time through difficult experience. Thank you, Reverend Walker, for being with us. You all have been listening to the Reverend Cecelia Walker, Executive Director of Chaplaincy and Clinical Pastoral Education at Brookwood Baptist Health. We sure are glad Reverend Walker that you chose to be with us today and share your wisdom and experience with our audience and we�re thankful to our audience members as well for being with us. We are praying for you and your health and safety. Hope you�re experiencing the joy of the Lord in a more profound way than ever these days. Thanks to one and all. Thanks be to the Lord who provides for us in good times and in bad. Goodbye for now. >>Kristen Padilla: You�ve been listening to the Beeson podcast. Our theme music is written and performed by Advent Birmingham of the Cathedral Church of the Advent in Birmingham, Alabama. Our engineer is Rob Willis. Our announcer is Mike Pasquarello. Our co-hosts are Doug Sweeney and, myself, Kristen Padilla. Please subscribe to the Beeson podcast at www.BeesonDivinity.com/podcast or on iTunes.