I was meeting with a physician to discuss my first colonoscopy when a nurse rushed into his office and said there was an emergency: A patient had collapsed in the waiting area. The doctor hurried out. I followed at a distance. An elderly gentleman was lying face down on the floor with a uniformed caregiver standing over him. The old man was dressed in black and did not appear to be breathing. He was a priest. There wasn’t much the doctor could do with the old priest collapsed on the floor of the waiting room. The nurse called 911. As we waited for the ambulance, the doctor nonchalantly resumed explaining the colonoscopy to me in the reception area, occasionally glancing at the priest on the floor. A few minutes later, three emergency personnel burst into the tiny office and struggled to revive the ailing patient. The small waiting room was packed with patients, emergency personnel, bulky equipment and the stricken man sprawled on the floor—no one could enter or leave. The doctor grumbled that he had recently been certified for geriatric patients and regretted the additional work.
The caregiver standing over the priest did not speak English. The emergency workers frantically tried to revive the prostrate patient, while the attendant impassively observed the hubbub, adding a whiff of indifference to the drama. I guessed the priest to be about 85, maybe older. After about 15 minutes, the doctor ushered me back into his office, closed the door and completed his explanation of the procedure.
The colonoscopy went well. I inflated my weight by 20% on the questionnaire, leading to an excessive amount of sedation. As the anesthesia lifted me aloft and away from the faint voice of the attending physician, I thought about the priest that I encountered at the doctor’s office. He had probably served the church for 50 or 60 years. He would have studied Latin at the seminary, and experienced the enormous changes of Vatican II and the transition to the English mass. He committed himself to Christ at a time when faith was widespread and easily accepted. He conducted thousands of weddings, baptisms and funerals during his lifetime. I had observed the final moments of a journey that he had begun in the same position when ordained into the priesthood many years before.
It suddenly occurred to me that I had forgotten to pray for the priest as he lay dying in that crowded waiting room. I guess it didn’t matter. The angels were there to carry him over the stars.
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