Tuesday, September 21, 2021
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Mark was such an important part of my success as a hospital and then hospice chaplain in Austin, TX. Mark loved all the students he taught and sustained them long after they were no longer in his January Pastoral care class.
He gave me my first job as a chaplain, at South Austin Medical Center (St. David's) and helped support me through a very difficult chaplain clinical residency years later at Seton.
Mark taught me how to be a sacred Chaplain and come alongside patients and family as a listener, hand-holder, and always with an open heart. Mark taught me to slow down no matter what the emergency so I could be present no matter what I faced at my job.
He had this trick he passed on where you put your hands in your pants pockets on the way to an emergency as this would ground you and help you stay calm and walk calmly. I bought only work pants with pockets so I could do his trick.
He loved to laugh deeply and did not care for superficial conversations. He wrote a poetry book and his life as a spiritual advisor and Chaplain was poetry in motion.
He strived to live his values of love, comfort, and non-judgment when he was a chaplain and his knowledge of what a chaplain should be and do affected my whole life and my work as a chaplain.
I'm so glad my Mom got to meet him and he took time to share lunch with us. I'm so proud that I worked for and learned from him. I'm so grateful to have known him and will miss his laughter in this world. I know that his love will continue because of the thousands of patients and their families he touched during his life.
I loved him and l will not forget him.
Every time we talked, he would end the conversation with two words, saying,”Be well.”
And so I send to him, “Be well, my dear mentor, free of pain, your soul flying high across the veil lifted by all those you touched.”
I send love as well to his family and all those who loved him.
