Once she started to scream, she couldn't stop.  It was some kind of reflex.  Every ten seconds or so she'd emit an explosion of sound.  Her name was Mary.

I was an assistant chaplain at the state hospital for the mentally ill.  This was many years ago, but I will never forget Mary's howling shriek that went on and on for hours.

I was part of the medical team in Mary's ward.  We did everything we could think of to help her, but nothing worked.  Finally she was isolated.  They put her in a cubbyhole with one small window, her bed, a chair, no air conditioning, not even a fan.  They felt something radical had to be done.  Mary's screaming was affecting the entire ward.  The staff and patients were on edge; morale was at an all time low.

I did everything I could think of to interrupt that reflexive shriek. I spent hours on the wooden chair beside her.  I talked; I read; I played tapes of gentle and soothing Mozart.  And, of course, I prayed.  But nothing helped.  I was terribly discouraged.

One afternoon I was standing beside Mary's bed holding her hand when the door opened.  It was Mini.  She was a patient.  I knew her, a lovely little lady in her eighties.  She came in, shut the door behind her.  I knew she had wandered away from her ward.  She went to the foot of Mary's bed.  She looked at her with such concern.  No, more than concern, it was a warm, gentle love.

Finally, she said to me:  "Is she in pain?  Is she in pain?"  I said, "I don't know, Mini, I just don't know."

Mini moved ever so slowly to the head of the bed.  She stood beside her with a hand on Mary's forehead.  Her hair and forehead were matted with sweat.  The poor thing showed all the ravages of age and disease.

            Mini looked at me and said, almost in a whisper, "Isn't she beautiful!  Isn't she beautiful?  Look at this hair, these soft blond curls; and her skin; these rosy cheeks."  And Mini continued.

            After a minute or so, Mary stopped screaming.  I could see that she was distracted.  She was listening.  "Isn't she beautiful!  Look, that lovely smile and those sparkling teeth!  Actually Mary had no teeth, but that didn't matter in the least.  She was drifting through the long ago world of her youth.

            Just at that moment, a nurse came bustling thru the door.  "Mini, there you are!  You come with me right this minute."  She took Mini by the hand and pulled her out of the room.

            No sooner had the door closed than Mary started to scream.  At first it wasn't her raucous scream, but more of a moan.  The moments of drifting through a younger time were gone.  Gradually the old scream returned.

            I was disappointed -- even shocked.  I don't know what I expected of Mini's healing visit, but I prayed it would not now be as it was before.

            But then I had a thought -- more than a thought, an impulse.  I moved to the head of the bed where Mini had been standing.  I put my hand on Mary's forehead.  I stroked it gently.  "Isn't she beautiful!" I murmured.  "Isn’t she beautiful.  These soft blond curls.  And her skin, those rosy cheeks."

            As I was painting a make believe memory, I was saying to myself:  "Dear Lord, please don't let anyone come in and hear me talking like this.  They'll think I've snapped my cap.  They'll lock me up and throw away the key."

            Still, I persevered.  And do you know -- that after a minute or two, she stopped screaming.  She was listening.  She closed her eyes.  And a few minutes later, she fell into a deep sleep.  What a blessing!  What a healing Gift of Peace.

            Late one night, weeks later, I was daydreaming in the Chapel.  I thought of Mary and Mini.  Like a bolt from the proverbial blue, it came to me that I saw Christ that afternoon in the stifling furnace of a room -- The Hidden Christ in Mini, teaching me how I might relieve Mary's distress. 

At the Last Judgment, "when the Son of Man comes in his glory escorted by all the angels of heaven" what measuring stick will he use when he separates the sheep from the goats?  Surely he will note our little gifts of mercy and of love.  (Read again, please, about "The Last Judgment" (Mt. 25:31-46).

            Christ did not leave us orphans but He left himself to us in hidden ways.  Most importantly in the Holy Eucharist but also the hidden Christ is within each and every one of His "little ones," His children, "my least brothers" (Mt. 25:40).  Remember his prayer for "All Believers"?  "That they may be one as we are one, I living in them, you living in me -- that their unity may be complete" (Jn. 17:22, 23).

Fr. Robert McQueeney, 1919 - 2002
Spiritual Director
The Padre Pio Foundation of America, 1982-2002