Last Friday night we held our “Annual Speaker’s Night” at our local theatre. This is the third year our congregation has offered this evening to the community. The first year we had Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish; last year we hosted Dr. Smanatha Nutt. After two years of casting an eye to global strife we decided it was time to offer something a little closer to home. We invited Dr. Brian Goldman, host of the radio programme “White Coat Black Art”, author of two books and ER doctor at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto. We asked him to speak on the topic, “The Tough Talk about End-of-Life Care”. He did not disappoint.
It was a year ago when we asked Dr. Goldman to come to Bracebridge and we had no idea at the time that is presentation would be so timely and topical. The convening of the Supreme Court last week to discuss the right to physician-assisted suicide made our topic top of the news.
Dr. Goldman talked about the physician’s discomfort with end-of-life issues and how hard it is to face the topic when someone’s vocation is to make people well. He also told us that advancing science and medical technology mean life can be prolonged as never before. And then he talked about the hard decisions that face family members. This situation he is well aware of as his father died last year and his mother died just three weeks ago. He ended the evening, prompted by a specific question, by reflecting as a man of faith on what death means and the continuation of life into the mystery of God’s love. He spoke of death as a holy moment and one we should celebrate as much as we celebrate a birth. In truth, it was a holy moment when he explained watching a person die and seeing the countenance change as life ebbed away. He said, for him, it was impossible to watch a person die and not believe in God.
Dr. Goldman left us with much to think about, the practical need of talking to family and helping them understand our wishes as to medical intervention at the time of our demise as well as the heightened spiritual experience of death. It was a great Doctor’s visit.
