After my two year residency as a hospital chaplain at Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami, Florida, I was hired as a team chaplain for a hospice organization to provide spiritual care to the terminally ill at six nursing homes throughout the Miami-Dade County area. I always tried to make sure that each patient and their families that I saw were given all the services that I could provide, plus access to whatever resources I had available to cope with their situation. So whenever I visited a patient or family, I would try to find out their spiritual needs and do whatever I could to meet them. So on several occasions after visiting a number patients who were Roman Catholic, who responded when I asked them if they would like for me to have a priest visit them, they replied, “No! No! Please don’t ask a priest to come.” This puzzled me. So one day I ask my good friend and fellow chaplain, Father Benny, why these people were so adamant about not having me ask a priest to come. He smiled, and then told me it was because the priest is only called under those circumstances to administer the last rites, and they didn’t want that because it would mean they’ve given up. I thanked him and made sure I never did it again. But at the same time I was also having a curious reaction from Jewish patients that I didn’t understand. Whenever I would ask if they would like for me to have a Rabbi stop by, they would tell me right away, “Oh no! Please don’t bother. That’s not necessary. I don’t think I want to see a Rabbi right now. I had the privilege of mentoring a Rabbi for another team, so I asked him one day why they didn’t want me to arrange for a Rabbi to come see them. He chuckled and then told me, “It’s because they would have to pay a Rabbi to come.” That really got me to thinking. So I started taking more notice when I asked patients who were listed as Protestants in their chart if they would like for me to contact their pastor and see if he could come. Much to my surprise, when I did asked, most of them declined saying, “Oh I don’t want to bother him because he is very busy.” It was at that time I began to thank the good Lord that I could call on Him without any of these mitigating conditions being involved. That I could visit with Him in prayer each day without waiting until I’m about to die. And that I could go into His throne room of grace through prayer and not have to pay for Him to see me. But most of all that I could call on Him at any time and not find Him too busy to answer my prayer. What a marvelous God we serve! What a wonderful Savior we have! And what a fantastic Holy Spirit we possess to guide us everyday! – Dr. Robert R Seyda