The jumble of curves I organized in the photographic image at left represents the oldest and most sacred relationship we experience in the early months of our lives.

   We learn love first from our mothers. It is she from whom we emerge and she that holds us against her skin.

   Before we utter words, we speak skin to skin. We will cherish this contact for the rest of our lives. 

   Without skin contact, babies perish, doctors tell us. Far beyond this medical fact is the power of the kind of touch we can offer to others.

   For all of us know that cruelty has always been rampant in our world. Sometimes, I wonder if violence comes most often from the clinched fist of those who were never held lovingly as babies and small children.

   It is no accident that the majority of first line caregivers are women. Most girls grow up in settings that value kindness from females.

   Too many males are raised with the idea that problems are often better resolved by physical strength and power rather then by compassion and respect. Would it be better for America's hospitals if they were run by women instead of men (as is the case in over 80% of hospitals)?

   It is interesting to me that my fellow males, the ones that run most of the countries in our world, are persistently finding ways to launch wars. What would happen if women took over?

   What does any of that have to do with "touch?" It is the open hand that heals, not the closed one.

   We see images of Jesus opening his hands to welcome others into the light of Love. It is Jesus who we see healing with the touch of his sacred hands.

   It is Jesus who set the example of Love for all of us, men and women. Think of the night of his betrayal when he healed a wounded Roman soldier who had come to arrest him. He reached out his hand not to strike an enemy, but to heal the severed ear of a fellow child of God. 

   Caught in our bodies as we are, it is the empathetic touch of another that we seek in the midst of our greatest weakness.

   Our society imposes many boundaries around what is "appropriate" contact. Within these boundaries, the best caregivers know that one of the most powerful tools they have is not a needle or a blood pressure cuff. Their finest gifts often come through hands guided by God's Love.

-Reverend Erie Chapman

*Photograph – "Julie & Ryder" copyright Erie Chapman 2010