“I guess God’s decided it’s not time for you to die,” said Dr. Denis Bouchard one day last August. We were in his office at the Institute de Cardiologie de Montréal/Montreal Heart Institute after he had examined my test results.
God’s decided or science has decided? The first operation like mine was performed in 1960 and the process has been remarkably refined since. A couple of generations ago I would have died. I believe that it was God’s grace that inspired the scientists and for that I am thankful.
The story began about three years earlier when my family doctor recommended a stress test, 12 minutes on a treadmill with electrocardiogram wires attached. The attending doctor picked up something and referred me to a cardiologist. Another test, an echocardiogram like those used for fetus photos, turned up severe aortic stenosis, a 90-per cent blockage of the aorta, the main artery that distributes blood. Because I experienced no symptoms except the slow diminution of strength we often attribute to aging, the cardiologist suggested that an operation be delayed for as long as possible.
Another stress test last spring led to an angiogram, during which a thin dye-filled catheter is studied by x-ray, and the proposal to operate within six months. As I had recently solicited proposals from five retailers for a new computer, I thought it useful to shop around for something far more important. Through a member of our extended family, I was referred to Dr. Bouchard.
Created in 1954, the MHI is one of North America’s most respected cardio centers. Dr. Bouchard has directed the cardiac surgery program since 2008 and has operated on more than 3,000 patients, so I’m neither the first nor the last. One of the specialties he has helped pioneer is minimally invasive surgery which, for aortic valve replacement, involves a small incision in the upper-right chest rather than cutting through the sternum, use of instruments resembling long chopsticks, less pain and quicker recovery.
Meeting with my wife and me in September, Dr. Bouchard had noted a 50 per cent blockage of an obtuse circumflex artery in the heart. The aorta problem was due to natural calcium build-up, the artery issue more likely related to beer, pizza and wings. As the doctor explained things, I thought of the psalmist: how wonderfully are we knit together in our mothers’ wombs. Although not requiring immediate surgery, we agreed that the artery be bypassed at the same time, leading to the sternum entry and a three-month recovery at home.
I awaited the impending operation with confidence. I expected to feel awful for a few days and recover fully and better. Indeed, Dr. Bouchard promised an additional 20 yards on my tee shots. Better a plumbing problem, I thought, than other health related horrors.
I entered hospital on November 5 last year and was operated on the following morning. Of course, I remember nothing of the procedure but well remember three days in intensive care. Deep in confused sleepless nights, I thought prayer would be a good idea but God’s line seemed to be busy.
Maybe it was the drugs. If my fate was to endure such suffering for a year before an inevitable ending, I’d probably reconsider my general opposition to physician-assisted suicide and hoped instead that I’d have the quiet courage to volunteer for some advanced research project.
For reading, I had a book lent by our minister, Rev. Jeff Veenstra, featuring the transcription of the famed dialogue between distinguished theologians John Dominic Crossan and N.T. Wright, followed by eight commentaries by theologians and philosophers. Pretty heavy stuff for the occasion, but resurrection seemed a fitting theme.
Without going into mind-numbing detail, Wright supports a thesis of Jesus’ physical resurrection and Crossan the concept of a metaphorical return. The commentators agree with one or both to greater or lesser degrees. If the brightest kids in the class can’t figure it out, what are we bozos in the back row supposed to do?
Faced with the gift of life that has been offered me, I am cheered that these two in the end agree. Bishop Wright says: “… the resurrection stories in the Gospels do not say that Jesus is raised, therefore we’re going to heaven or therefore we’re going to be raised. They say Jesus is raised, therefore God’s new creation has begun and we’ve got a job to do.” And Dominic Crossan writes in a closing essay: “… believers are living the resurrected life that incarnates the nonviolent God of justice and peace who was revealed in Christ. We are not waiting for God to act. God has already acted and is waiting for us to react, to collaborate, to cooperate, to get with the divine program.”
In other words, Jesus is not just about believing; Jesus is about doing. I’ll have to keep that in mind in the years ahead.
Rev. Veenstra had suggested a Lenten study series based on the dialogue. Gerbern Oegema, a professor of religious studies at McGill, and I developed one.
A few days after my operation, Jeff had entered hospital for a routine operation. Doctors found cancer and by Easter he lay dying. I visited him a few days before he entered palliative care and he asked how the series was going. I told him of the views of Wright and Crossan quoted above.
“I’m surprised they’d say that,” he said with a smile. “The Christian promise is so much more than that. We’re promised everlasting life in a new spiritual body. When you get there, I’ll be waiting. You won’t recognize me, but I’ll be there.”
“I’ll recognize you,” I told my frequent golfing buddy. “You’ll still be hitting those 280-yard hooks into the woods.”
I saw him once or twice again and now he’s gone. I’m left thankful for the gift of a faith so far beyond anything I’d ever grasped before. Au revoir, mon ami. À la prochaine.
About Keith Randall
Keith Randall is a freelance writer in Montreal.