Visiting the hospital every day is a good thing for the Rev. Thomas Malia, 52.
Malia is one of nine chaplains at Mercy Medical Center who cares for patients and their families? spiritual needs.
Before accepting a chaplain position at Mercy in Baltimore five years ago, Malia worked in Archdiocese of Baltimore parishes, urban and suburban, for 19 years. He primarily works in the intensive care unit and transitional care floor, where patients receive physical and occupational therapy, but he is available 24 hours a day for emergency room patients.
Q What does the pastoral care team do?
A We?re one of the few people that patients will encounter who don?t ask anything of them. … A lot of patients don?t have experience with organized religion or have negative experiences and don?t know what to do with us. We accept all without any judgment. We?re not trying to proselytize, preach or save them. We?re trying to be with them and their families, the hospital staff or whoever their support group is.
Sometimes when patients have limited education and the doctors are using “doctor speak,” we can?t translate but we can help the patient understand exactly what?s going on. We also help on advanced directives or living wills, which are extremely important for everyone to have.
Q How do you cope with what meets you every day at work?
A [The hospital] is the most dramatic but satisfying place, because you?re really dealing with people when they?re open, dealing with issues of mortality. One of the hardest things as parish priest for me was to go to the hospital because I couldn?t fix [patients? illnesses], and I?m a fixer. … What happens here challenges my own sense of morality. It?s very demanding. … American medicine, as most people know, is in a great period of transition. The learning curve is tremendous.
Q What?s the most rewarding part of your job?
A One of the most gratifying things is to engage in the Anointing of the Sick. … It?s extremely important. … We try to get as many people to surround the patient, and the priest offers [prayer] and then we use holy oil … blessed by the bishop every year. We extend not just the prayer of the local community, but the whole church community.
For a person?s healing and restoration, everyone lays their hands on the patient to invoke the Holy Spirit to come upon that person. I really do believe energy is transferred when they intentionally focus on something or someone. It?s prayer in its most pure form.
DID YOU KNOW?
» Six nuns from the Sisters of Mercy, a religious order founded by 18th-century Irishwoman Catherine McAuley, helped transform a dingy, former schoolhouse on the corner of Calvert and Saratoga streets into Mercy Medical Center.
» When McAuley inherited a fortune in 1822, she opened housing in an affluent neighborhood for street children and women who were prostituting themselves in order to live. Mercy Medical Center continues Sr. McAuley?s work by taking care of the poor and marginalized, the Rev. Thomas Malia said.
LOCATION
Mercy Medical Center
» 301 St. Paul Place, Baltimore
» 410-332-9000, www.mdmercy.org
