(Written for the Scroll for December, 2009)

Deb Goldfeder, RN, FCN

As you read this, I will be preparing to return to St. Louis from a mission to Southern Sudan.  You will hear me talk about drought, hunger, thirst and human misery there as a nation strives toward the election that will finally put in place either their first elected government or plunge the country back into civil war.  It is, as last week’s lectionary reminded me, the birthing pains that are just beginning. 

Parish Nursing in Sudan could bring health, healing and wholeness to people who have not experienced it in body, mind or spirit.  Nutritional problems can be addressed, people can be referred to the physicians more quickly, problems with high blood pressure can be identified before people develop kidney failure or heart disease, and children might be vaccinated against the diseases that most of have not seen in decades.  That’s all to the good and I appreciate the support of First Congregational Church in allowing me to go to see about bringing this type of care to a part of the world that desperately needs it.  But…  Read the rest of this entry »

(Scroll article for April, 2010)

At the Advent Christmas party in 2006, Pam Willis, doubtless tired of hearing about Lui and how much I loved it and the people there, gave me a gift.  It was a zip-lock bag that contained straw, dirt and a bottle of water.  She called it a “Mud Hut Starter Kit” and I still have it!  It reminds me of a time when I had so much to process about my experience but nobody who could understand what I was saying.  I came back profoundly changed and not altogether for the better!  It was a painful time but there were painful times in Lui, too.  The people there, loving and caring though they were, couldn’t understand me as much as they wished they could and I found that pouring out my feelings in my journals didn’t quite process all that needed processing, either.  Read the rest of this entry »

(Scroll Article for March 2010)

“Remember you are dust and to dust you will return.”  These words are said as ashes are applied to our foreheads on Ash Wednesday as we are invited to keep a Holy Lent.  We bring the palms from Palm Sunday that have blessed our houses all year and burn them in a bonfire after eating our fill of pancakes while wearing gaudy plastic beads and funny hats.  “Remember you are dust and to dust you will return.”  We hear it but do we really understand what it means to be dust?  And to return to dust?  Read the rest of this entry »

(Scroll Article for March 2009) 

“How much do you weigh?”  Not a question that a girl like me likes to hear.  Fortunately, I was allowed to write it down and didn’t have to say it out loud in the middle of a meeting of missioners.  Our flight from Entebbe to Mundri was to be on a small plane where every pound had to be calculated into flight information.  So I actually added a couple of pounds to the number just to be safe but that was before we went to the wedding in London.  We had wedding cake, congratulatory toasts, traditional French candies and croissants for breakfast so those couple of pounds I added to my weight rapidly became reality!  I began to have nightmares that the plane would crash because I was over my weight which only caused me to eat more.  Crazy thinking!  Read the rest of this entry »