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You are here: Home / New Mexico / Touch

Touch

August 2nd, 2016 by Sallie Bingham in New Mexico, Religion 12 Comments

Risen-2016

Holy Faith Church, Santa Fe

Last week Father Ken Semon, rector of Holy Faith Church here in Santa Fe, was killed in a freak bike accident when his front wheel caught in a collapsed cattle guard.

A freak accident seems to most of us not only bewilderingly strange but meaningless, and this was at first my interpretation of Father Ken’s death, which plunged his assistant clergy and his congregation into mourning.

On reflection, though, I don’t believe it was a freak. Several months ago, Father Ken instituted one of the many laypeople ministries at Holy Faith, training some of the congregation to help heal grief. Several were at the meeting of the congregation I attended yesterday.

And, though a vigorous man who biked eighteen miles a day, Father Ken was suffering what would probably have proved to be terminal cancer.

It has always been clear to me that words, on which I’ve built my creative life, can’t heal. They can illuminate and inspire... but those same words would be powerless to heal in the face of tragedy.

Not can I believe that his death is an unmitigated tragedy—certainly not for him, returned to the Kingdom he believed in so passionately, but also not for his congregation, having begun some time ago a search for a rector.

Perhaps his death was not a tragedy for some in his congregation, not because our hearts are hardened—he was much loved—but because the way his church is handling his loss is bringing new life.

I have never been a convinced Christian, let alone a faithful church attendant, since my early adolescence when a dispute with my mother over whether I should take communion when I believed I was in a state of sin—she insisted I should, I insisted I shouldn’t—broke the already-damaged faith that had so inspired me as a child, when stained glass windows glowing with light and the majestic cadences of the great Protestant hymns had lifted me nearly to transcendence.

The years have passed, with many changes, some of them the result of family tragedies which have brought me to my knees, and back to the church, although still of the wavering faith that compelled one of Jesus’ followers to beg him, “I believe, heal thou my unbelief.” (Mark 2/24)

I believe in the magnificent meaning of Father Ken’s death because of the advice given to us by one of the grief counselors, Camille, who having been through tragedy of her own impresses me with her wisdom and her sense of humor.

She urged the hundred or so people sitting at round tables in the parish hall to stand and reach out to each other with prayer-shaped hands, then to open those closed hands to hold the hands of a neighbor, blessing that person with “May the Lord be with you,” to which the response was “And with they spirit.”

I have visited many counselors of every stripe and description, been to many meetings to address the problems that afflict so many of us, read many self-help books (which did not seem to address this self), heard many sermons and speeches full of good advice. But I have never heard anyone speak of the healing power of touch.

It is, generally, forbidden to all counselors to touch the people they are trying to counsel; doctors touch less and less as their time with a patient is whittled down to a few minutes; group meetings may occasionally stand up and hold hands, but to reach out and touch someone, except for family and close friends, might even be considered an assault. And in many families, there is little or no touching, which seems to carry the taint of sexual predation. When lovers or spouses or partners break apart, the greatest loss for each may be the loss of touch. But even in those relationships, there is sometimes little or no touching except what leads to sex.

It has always been clear to me that words, on which I’ve built my creative life, can’t heal. They can illuminate and inspire, as the last sentences of Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway illuminated and inspired me when I re-read the novel a few weeks ago, making me exclaim with excitement and gratitude.

But those same words would be powerless to heal in the face of tragedy.

Since Father Ken loved his congregation, with the focused and unquestioned love most of us only see, briefly, in our young children or, later, in our dogs, he would be delighted to know that his death, so devastating on a personal level to his family and close friends, sealed my bond with a church from which I had been sliding, slowly, away—my habit with those edifices, those congregations, that particular brand of wisdom. And if it had that effect on me, it surely did on others, especially the French couple, new to the parish, who spoke to me in that language I love.

I may never touch anyone in the congregation, made up almost entirely of strangers, except in the Sunday service Passing of the Peace my mother so abhorred; but the recognition of the signal power of touch unites me with a core belief that not only matches this congregation but also the teachings of Jesus, who healed through touch, reaching out to the afflicted despised by his world, touching lepers and adulteresses and the dead.

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In New Mexico, Religion Virginia Woolf

A long and fruitful career as a writer began in 1960 with the publication of Sallie Bingham's novel, After Such Knowledge. This was followed by 15 collections of short stories in addition to novels, memoirs and plays, as well as the 2020 biography The Silver Swan: In Search of Doris Duke.

Her latest book, Taken by the Shawnee, is a work of historical fiction published by Turtle Point Press in June of 2024. Her previous memoir, Little Brother, was published by Sarabande Books in 2022. Her short story, "What I Learned From Fat Annie" won the Thomas Wolfe Fiction Prize in 2023 and the story "How Daddy Lost His Ear," from her forthcoming short story collection How Daddy Lost His Ear and Other Stories (September 23, 2025), received second prize in the 2023 Sean O’Faolain Short Story Competition.

She is an active and involved feminist, working for women’s empowerment, who founded the Kentucky Foundation for Women, which gives grants to Kentucky artists and writers who are feminists, The Sallie Bingham Center for Women's History and Culture at Duke University, and the Women’s Project and Productions in New York City. She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Sallie's complete biography is available here.

Comments

  1. Letitia Quinn on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 9:36 am

    Touched by your words Sallie! Saw your beautiful church as we left Julia’s last night and the wind was blowing and storm brewing. Thought of you! ♡

    Reply
  2. Jean-Marie Welch says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 10:39 am

    Beautiful message that resonates with me today as I struggle with the paradoxes and contradictions within the Roman Catholic Church of my formative years,–the church that I abandoned in my teens–and the search for truth and spiritual community as an aging adult. I would like to find more insightful writing about these difficult transitions. Thank you for opening the conversation.

    Reply
  3. Leslie Dillen says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 11:01 am

    What a beautiful and moving tribute Sallie! Your words do help in healing. Thank you.

    Reply
  4. Larry Baker on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 12:12 pm

    Sallie, that is so true. Very profound.

    Reply
  5. James Voyles on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 12:16 pm

    Touching, reassuring, and inspired by grace. Thank you. ?

    Reply
  6. Patti George on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 12:32 pm

    I too believe this was inspired by grace and I loved reading it

    Reply
  7. Carol McClure on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 12:33 pm

    What grace-inspired words! Thank you.

    Reply
  8. Marilyn McLaughlin on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 1:37 pm

    and still, with all my disagreements with the Catholic Church, it is still my go to place for peace.

    Reply
  9. Sharon Rodriguez on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 1:47 pm

    Deeply touching message. Thank you for sharing a piece of your spirit.

    Reply
  10. Nancy Belle Fuller says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 2:35 pm

    Thank you for this lovely piece of soul sharing. Sorry for the loss of your kind friend. Perhaps, he was being spared from the gloom of dealing with cancer and very blessed with a good death doing something he loved like riding his bicycle. And also thank you for the photo of this beautiful church. There is much elegance in its simplicity.

    Reply
  11. Carol M. Johnson says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 3:03 pm

    It makes my heart happy to read such personal words of your faith journey. As a church musician of 43 years, the words of a hymn of the ’70s came flowing into my mind as I read this…..”Reach Out and Touch”…….which closes by saying, “Reach out and let the smile of God touch thru you.”
    I think God smiles when we “reach out and touch a spirit in despair.” (Hymn by Charles F. Brown)

    Reply
  12. Vivian Lee Gabbard on Facebook says

    August 2nd, 2016 at 5:22 pm

    Words frequently don’t really express our heart feelings but the power of touch is an endless and lasting expression of that love in our hearts! Thank you for the reminder!

    Reply

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