Earlier this year I read one of Braestrup's earlier works, Here If You Need Me, which I quite enjoyed, so I was predisposed to like her most recent work (2010): Marriage and Other Acts of Charity: A Memoir. As an ordained minister myself, although not a chaplain but a parish pastor, I find a real sense of connection with Braestrup's work. Although our faith traditions are divergent from one another's (she a Unitarian-Universalist and I a United Methodist), I find her theological reflections delightful, not because I always agree, but because she is so articulate and finessed in expressing her experience of God. Her theological emphasis is that Love is the best way descriptor of and conductor of spiritual connection with the Divine.
Braestrup's work is bound to offend Christians of a more pietistic or evangelical bent. Her language is honest and candid, but not always free of profanity. Her ethical stances on some issues (living together without the benefit of marriage, for example) may also make the more conservative Christian uncomfortable.
But let's be clear. This is not an ethics textbook, nor a theological treatise. Braestrup is writing from within her context as a chaplain for the Maine Warden Service, and her professional work is exercised in connection with many difficult situations, including unexpected and tragic death situations. Those with whom she works most closely are able to do their work by cultivating a gritty sort of take on life, and her task as a chaplain is to find ways to accompany others in their spiritual journeys.
Perhaps this is what I find most refreshing about Braestrup. She is a real person, doing real ministry in the real world. She is anything but sanctimonious, or "other," or disengaged from her ministry context. Indeed, her gift is the ability to communicate elegantly while maintaining the integrity of her ministry context. The reader has the pleasure of benefiting from her theological competence, while capturing a true glimpse of what her work is really like.
This volume includes many of her reflections on marriage, nicely interspersed with both theological reflection and captivating personal accounts (of both her own relationships as well as those with whom she works as chaplain). I'm glad I read this book today because I have two weddings tomorrow, and I may well use some of what I read here in the homilies that I will preach.
If you have never read Kate Braestrup, now is the time, but I would recommend that you first read Here If You Need Me, as it will give you background information that will help make sense of many of the details. If you have read her first book already, you will be happy to know that some of your unanswered questions find closure here.
After reading Here If You Need Me several weeks ago, I did something I rarely do. I found the author's website, posted an email to her with thanks for her excellent writing and promptly forgot about it. To my surprise a few days later I received a personal email from her, thanking me for my comments and telling me that my email had arrived on the anniversary of her first husband's death, and that somehow my appreciation for her work helped to settle her jangled emotions. I was touched by her thoughtfulness in returning an email from an unknown reader. Maybe that's why I'm such a big Kate Braestrup fan!
But no, on second thought, it's not the email I received ... it's the meaning I receive from her work, which is conveyed in such a poignantly personal and loving manner. The email only confirmed what I already "knew" intuitively, that Braestrup has a gift. And is a gift.
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