In a neonatal ICU; a baptism

From the Jesuit publication, America. Hit the link for the whole article.

It is not that I had imagined my first baptism many times. But as a young Jesuit studying for the Catholic priesthood, I suspected the first time I administered the sacrament would be, perhaps, for a newborn baby of one of my college friends. I suppose I pictured a white chasuble, the Paschal candle, and the grand baptismal font you see in the back of many parishes. I did not expect it would happen in such a traumatizing way at 2 a.m. in a hospital. And I would not have guessed it to have happened at the intersection of my vocations as both a Jesuit and a nurse.

The whole experience was hellacious, but most terribly so when the neonatal team concluded the cold truth that this baby was too severely immature to withstand our attempt at resuscitation. She was born on just the wrong side of the cusp of viability; a week or even just a few more days in the womb could have made a life-sustaining difference.

As the baby’s nurse, my first instinct was that the mother should hold her 11-ounce child in these final seconds. However, in such chaos even that comfort was unviable. It turns out Hell’s likeness is a good place to contemplate Heaven, for my very next thought was, This baby needs to be baptized. Baptism was the only act of healing I had left to offer my patient.

“I need water,” I said. “Could someone please bring me water?”

The room stopped.

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When the water for baptism was brought to the bedside, the next most difficult thing to find was the breath with which to speak. Choking on grief, I could not breathe. I opened my mouth and soon shut it when I rapidly realized that the fragile facade my already cracking voice was unearthing would be all consumed by eruptive emotion.

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Unsure of where the words would come from and with warm water dripping from the basin of my fingers, I baptized the baby girl in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

I admit, the evangelical expression, “to be born again,” had never before resonated with me. But in the aftermath of the six-minute life of this baby girl, I do believe I watched her be delivered twice, once from life in the womb and once unto One eternal. This brief plunge into the Paschal Mystery was a baptism by fire for me, too.