Math professor to walk different path
Hospital patients and their families often need help dealing with intense emotional stress, and one OCCC professor is heeding the call.
Math Professor Paul Lew-is will begin serving as a chaplain for Mercy Health Center as soon as the summer semester ends, he said. He is currently teaching college algebra and an online intermediate math class.
Lewis said Catholic Archbishop Eusebius J. Beltran approached him in February and told him Mercy was looking for someone to be the next director of pastoral services.
Lewis was involved in part-time ministry with the Cathedral of Our Lady of Perpetual Help.
“It was one of these things where I felt I had to listen because the archbishop was talking to me,” Lewis said.
“He was (in) the mindset of, ‘I want what is best for you and your family.’”
Lewis said the job was offered to him May 26, a few days before Memorial Day.
He said there was a delay in taking the job because he still had unfinished business at OCCC in the summer.
“I agreed to teach two classes and I also had some department duties,” Lewis said. “I felt like I needed to fulfill those things because the college has been good to me.”
President Paul Sechrist said it is always a loss to the college when a dedicated faculty member leaves. However, Sechrist said, Lewis has his full support.
“Knowing Professor Lew-is, he will be an excellent chaplain,” Sechrist said.
And, in that role, he will teach many to cope with the difficult crises that life brings. I wish him great fulfillment.”
Lewis said he is certified by the National Association of Clinical Chaplains, an organization that certifies chaplains who complete four clinical pastoral education units.
He received a bachelor’s degree in pastoral ministry from Newman University in Wichita, Kan.
He is currently enrolled in a master’s program in pastoral ministry at the Aqui-nas Institute of Theology in St. Louis.
Chaplains at Mercy Health Center and other hospitals tend to patients who check into the hospital, Lewis said.
“The hospital is a place of paradox,” he said. “People don’t want to be there, but it’s a place they need to be in, in order to heal.”
Chaplains will typically visit every patient, as well as the hospital’s workers, at least once. He said caregivers and nurses also are in need of uplift.
“They get emotionally attached [to patients] as well and it is hard to see people suffer,” he said.
Staff Writer Eric Nguyen can be reached at SeniorWriter@occc.edu.
