Letter-11
Dear Friends,
Greetings and warm regards as you live and work in challenging times and difficult settings!
Let me tell you the story of the buttercups and honey bees in our garden!
The butter cups are open for about three hours in the morning. During the rest of the time, they remain folded, and not noticeable among its foliage. Their petals are thin and fragile, but colourful and gorgeous to look at. It is the colour and the delicate parallel design from the centre of the petals to the periphery, which make these flowers stand out. The golden hue at the base of the petals, which blend gently with the rest of the white colour of petals appears like halo at the base of the flower. The petals are so spread out to the periphery that there is a hollow in the centre, which is a resting place for insects, honeybees and ants, while receiving nectar. The last picture is the appearance of the flowers when the open up and fold up.
Most of the mission hospitals are fragile and vulnerable in more than one way. At this time, with the COVD 19 pandemic, most hospitals go through a stressful time. Yet our hospitals are the places, where people come trustfully. Not only that they receive help and care, but most of them go back refreshed because they came to a place where they felt valued and affirmed. It is an oasis of comfort and hope for many who come. A doctor who went to join a mission hospital recently said, ‘the buildings look old needing repair and renovation, but the staff are warm and work effusively. People come because they trust the mission hospital’. The staff in that hospital receive salary every month proportionate to the income of the hospital. Is this not ‘giving without counting the cost’! All of you give more than what you receive.
The patients come to a mission hospital to receive ‘nectar’ and go back restored! What might be this nectar! Your approach of, inclusiveness and distributive justice, sense of fairness, honesty, friendliness, and going out of your way to help, restricting the cost of care to an affordable level, avoiding procedures that are not needed, exercising highest level of ethical practice, excellence in care, compassionate use of technology etc.
A doctor told me that there would be some at the weekly mobile clinic, who came to have a ‘darshan’ of the clinical team, even when they have no illness. They make this ’pilgrimage’ to honour those who keep them healthy. You give away your ‘five loaves and two fish’ like the boy in the miracle of Jesus feeding the five thousand, so that God can bless your giving! It is in a mission hospital miracles take place almost every day!
I recall a sad incident when Anna and I were working at N.M.Wadia Hospital, Pune when a two year old child was brought gasping following eating ground nuts. Although the nut was taken by a bronchoscope from the trachea, he could not be revived. Dr Winifred Bailey, Obstetrician and Medical Superintendent, who heard about this incident offered free medical aid to the whole family for three years. She was so moved hearing about the loss of the only child of a young couple, that she offered to look after the child’s mother during her next pregnancy. This happened two years after my graduation. It was an introduction to the mission of Christian health care! This expression of thoughtfulness stays with me as an example of a ‘second mile journey’ that I have come across in other mission hospitals!
With warm regards,
M.C.Mathew 29.6.2020
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