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REFLECTION

Tripping up in Sister’s Shoes
Barbara Hudspith

n the mid 1990s, a frightening and tenacious illness my thoughts. When I was able to remain comfortable for
invaded my body and toppled my life. We had a full hour in the office chair, it was a red-letter day. My
been enjoying a summer jaunt around Scotland life was beginning to resemble normal.
and Ireland and suddenly it struck. Confident that Little did I know, however, that at the same time heal-
returning home to my own medical people would ing was enveloping me, Sister was struggling silently with
Iput things right, I was horrified to learn that no clear the abdominal cancer that would soon claim her. I was
diagnosis presented itself. Weeks and months went by. The devastated when she died. Had she not been younger
severity of the symptoms escalated and became chronic, than I and filled with spirit and grace? Had it not been
and my faithful caregivers had to return to work and to me that came to her frail and fearful? She was my rock.
school. With the evaporation of hope, I felt an urgent need This could not be happening. Appreciating the depths of
to find a spiritual director. my grief, the convent Sisters introduced me to the garden
that had been planted in her memory, and I began to sit
Knowing that I was too disabled to drive far from home, by the hour on the bench in front of the rose that had
friends suggested a Roman Catholic sister who lived in the been selected for its ruddiness and vibrancy.
convent that I could see from my kitchen window. Stifling Having begun a master’s in divinity in the Presbyterian
my Presbyterian paranoia and feeling hopelessly ignorant denomination in the late 1980s, I did not take long to
of the protocol, I plucked up my courage and dialed. It was realize that an introvert like myself would find such a
the best thing I could have done. public role impossibly grueling. Still feeling a call to
After my first session with Sister Barbara, a load began ministry and enjoying immensely the studies and the
to lift. While the pain did not diminish and the anxiety camaraderie, I had opted in the early 1990s for a parallel
did not decrease, I found my energy being redirected program that culminated not in ordination, but in the
and my world widening. Something was drawing me up writing of a thesis. It was at this latter institution that
from the depths. Of course, there was bound to be push- I had become acquainted with spiritual direction and
back. There always is. While seeing Sister on a weekly tucked that knowledge away in the hinder parts of my
basis and beginning to glimpse tiny pinholes of light, I psyche for future reference.
also began to experience a disturbing insurgence of guilt. As my health continued to improve, I yearned to
Faithful friends prayed over me and visited regularly. My return to my studies and complete the thesis I had been
church was attentive and genuinely pastoral. My fam- working on for my master’s in religion at the Anglican
ily was nothing less than stellar. How was it then that I seminary. Yet when this leg of the academic journey was
felt so isolated—so separate? What was this longing that finally behind me, I was surprised to find myself feeling
persisted and would not be satisfied? Surely I was spoiled restless and oddly incomplete. In time, this inexplicable
for choice, and there was no need to go beyond my urge to take yet another step became clearer.
immediate circle to find spiritual companionship. Worry While I had been invalided, several of the women who
nibbled away. Somehow I managed to turn a deaf ear and had visited me regularly during that period, had been drawn
continue my weekly visits to the convent. to my accounts of Sister Barbara and her ministry. “Couldn’t
Over the next three years, I mended by fits and starts. you offer spiritual direction with us?” they’d plead. “We
Sister Barbara was attentive and accommodating, and we know you haven’t been trained, but couldn’t you just try?”
both rejoiced when I graduated from the supine to the This had placed me on the horns of a dilemma. I was
upright. I had arrived for our first meeting with a battered reticent to take on a role that I had not been adequately
chaise lounge under my arm. It was the only portable aid prepared for, and yet there was urgency in their voices. I
I could transport, and by laying flat for the duration of had suggested that they find themselves seasoned spiritual
our sessions, I was able to minimize my pain and focus directors already ministering in the city, but this was not

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