Bathroom Duty and God

Every Monday morning, our St. Frances Inn staff "team" gets together for a sharing. We begin with psalms, have a spiritual reading, review one of the seven guidelines of the Franciscan ministry, and then share how we feel about what we've heard. Last Monday, the guideline was "We seek not simply to serve the physical needs of those we minister to but to build relationship with those whom we meet." As I (Mark) reflected on the guideline, I realized that for most of my time here I have been focusing on the tasks at hand and not so much on the people we serve. As a former administrator, I certainly was coming down on the side of "doing" rather that "being present". As I left the sharing session, I resolved to be open to allowing the Spirit to work through me to form relationships with our guests.

Later that week, I had bathroom duty. The job is basically to line people up and send them in an orderly way into our two public restrooms. I was half way into my 90 minute shift when I remembered the guideline about forming relationships, and so I decided to give it a try. The first two attempts were perfunctory: "How are you doing today? "Fine, how are you." "Nice Day, isn't it? "Yeah, real nice!", etc. Then a short guy with a pale blue hat moved to the front of the line.

I tried again: "How are you today?" He looked me right in the eye and with a tired, defeated face simply shook his head side to side. I said, "Tough day?" He replied, "Tough week!" I asked "Why?" He replied, "Too many drugs, got really drunk, and now I am $240 behind on my rent." Without even thinking about what I was saying, I asked, "So, what drugs are you doing?" He replied: "Crack". I felt my stomach contract: crack cocaine is a common street drug here, but this was the very first person that I personally had met who was a crack user. I said to him, "That is a really bad drug. You need to try to get off of it." He replied, "That is easy to say, hard to do." I said, "Yes, but you need to try." He looked at me and said "Why? I lost my child; I lost my wife; now what the f*** do I have to look forward to for Christmas?" I felt a flood of sympathy -- I wondered how I would react if one of my daughters and wife had died. It was easy to see how someone might turn to alcohol or drugs to ease the pain.

By this time, one of the bathrooms was open and the man went in. I wondered if there was anything at all that I could do to help. When he emerged a minute later, I asked him his name. "Steve" he replied. I said, "My name is Mark, and I know that it is not much, but I will pray for you. And if you ever want to talk, I would be happy to talk with you about all of this." He smiled briefly and walked away.

I don't know what will happen with Steve and me. Probably nothing, but I have noticed him coming to morning mass a couple of times since then and each time during the "Sign of Peace", our eyes meet and we exchange smiles and an embrace. If nothing else, at least he knows that another person is concerned about him and his suffering.