Mysterious Respite

After my dad died at Cedars-Sinai Hospital, I had the perhaps unrealistic idea that it would be a long time before it would be necessary for me to back there to visit anyone.

In the last year, though, at least three people I know have needed to be hospitalized there; happily all remain with us. Still it is a strain to be in a place where not only are people healed, but where many times, and ultimately, they pass away of the conditions which ail them.  You can feel the anxiety in the rooms and in the waiting spaces. I dread the day when I will be one of the patients in the beds captive to medical jargon and too often arrogant practioners.

Yesterday, as I was walking toward the anesthesia recovery room after a friend's surgery, I felt the hallway so familiar and it was only later that I realized this was where my father had "recovered" from his last procedure, an outpatient one, the idiocy of which was confirmed by the sepsis that overwhelmed his body and brought him back to the hospital for his final few days.   I guess I am still angry about how dad was, in my view, disregarded by his urologist and his internist.

This evening I had plans to survey a possible volunteer activity, reading for the blind and dyslexic--a way to practice the use of my voice, and give back to the community. I was in such a rush after the hospital to be out and stay out amid the sun and people engaged in their ordinary activities, that I got to the neighborhood in Hollywood, an interesting mix of seedy apartment buildings and classic old craftsman houses, way too early for my appointment.

I had a sandwich at an ubiquitous Subway watcing a customer argue over the fact that the special value meal of five dollars was no more.  I took a walk around the neighborhood as the sun was just beginning its descent.  Then I came upon this Church. I couldn't quite tell its denomination from the outside, but on closer inspection I saw that it was called St. John Garabed Armenian Apostolic Church. So it was either an Eastern Orthodox or a Catholic Eastern Rite Church. Such churches are always have amazing iconography, so different from the sometimes comparatively bland American Catholic Churches. I had never heard of a saint with this particular name. Rather than aimlessly killing time, quiet meditation seemed preferable.

In I went. There were quotes everywhere, virtually none in English. There were no bulletins, nothing to describe the history of the parish. But there were long lit tapers held in boxes of sand, an ancient feeling and so different from the little votives I light in Catholic parishes. There were only two people inside, a woman who looked to be internally bewailing something difficult, and a man in intense prayer. The light was entirely natural with sun streaming through the spectacular large stained glass images, bathing the surroundings in warm amber and red and where the glass was blue, that as well.

There was the tabernacle. Ah, but the altar was placed such that it was clear the celebration of the Eucharist was done by the priest with his back to the people. Orthodox indeed. Probably not a Catholic Church, but so familiar that I decided to stay and say the rosary, and absorb deep the silence around me. The man walked to the entrance of the altar blocked by velvet rope of the type you see at premieres, and made a repetive sign of the cross that looked more like the action of a censer by the thurifer, and then, rather than turn his back on the tabernacle he backed out of the Church. It occurred to me that this was the proper way to disengage from God before him. I loved the respect.

The Church empty, I interrupted my rosary to take a few pictures, using my cell phone, which later I saw was not permitted . My sense was that the prohibition was more about the ringing than the photography, and there was no forbidding of cameras.  A couple came into the Church, looked around quickly and went back down the aisle. They did not back out.

I finished my rosary and thought to say hello to the young man in the office I had seen on my way in and maybe ask about this Church and its history. When I got there, the couple was inside with him. I asked about the name "Garabed". The young man said something incongruous, "It's just the name"."But of a saint, right?"  No answer. I told him how lovely the Church was. I asked him if there was anything I could take away to read about it. No. He did not elaborate. Civil though he was, it was clear that I was regarded as a stranger, and for that matter, not one to be trusted or particularly welcomed. My sense of peace dissipated a bit and a sadness replaced it. Here we all are people of faith and there is such a separation among us that is truly not God's Will.  Still, I thought, what a lovely place to come and sit and consider the  somber mysteries of men that make the so afraid of one another, and the awesome Mystery of God.

So, in fact, they have a website and the St. John is the Baptist himself. There are many Armenian churchs, and it was of Eastern Orthodoxy, with that name. They appear to be fierce about their view that they are descended in a true line from the apostles themselves. I wasn't interested in the debates of theology about the fullness of our respective faiths. I just wanted to sit for a while, and rest in the Lord.