Is hospital chaplaincy a pagan vocation?

The other day I was visiting parishioners in the hospital when I had one of those incredible pastoral visits when you know you have done the work of the Lord. I found myself wondering if I might like to become a hospital chaplain at some point. Certainly the ecumenical chaplaincy staff at the Catholic hospital in Texas where my father-in-law passed away last December would be wonderful to join. And I also thought about the possibility that my local secular hospital might fund a chaplaincy position.

But then I thought about a friend who is a Presbyterian pastor in the Midwest, who is also a chaplain at a large secular facility. In such a setting he is often called to sublimate his Christian convictions to serve patients and staff who espouse a non-Christian tradition or none at all. Too often he is required to offer prayers to a generic god, or affirm some amorphous “immortality of the soul” rather than the hope of resurrection when speaking with a terminal patient of indeterminate religious affiliation.

Of late he has put me on his email list for his weekly spiritual messages sent to hospital staff. They tend toward the abstraction of generalized spiritual principles rather than being grounded in the admittedly scandalous particularity of Christ crucified. Thus the Gospel becomes a subset of some overarching category of “religion” of which there are a plethora of authentic religious and spiritual expressions.

Now note that this is not to dismiss the possibility that the imam visiting the Muslim patient may well impart a real spiritual benefit, but as a Christian I would see such a benefit in terms of the Orthodox maxim: “We know where the Spirit is. We do not know where the Spirit is not.” Any spiritual benefit is ultimately a presence of the benefit of the death and resurrection of Christ, although not known by that name. (See the story of Emeth in Lewis’ fantasy The Last Battle for what I am thinking in this regard.)

But in any event, it is not my call to serve an anonymous Christianity, if such exists, but to know nothing but Christ Jesus and him crucified. From this perspective, hospital chaplaincy in a secular institution would force me to live as a pagan, espousing my own deity, Jesus, as my own private household god, but serving the amorphous god of “religion” or “spirituality” in my public vocation.

Too many martyrs of the early church died because they would not serve such a god, nor would they relegate the Lord of heaven and earth to the status of an idol on the hearth.