‘Remember that every seminarian that you support walks into a hospital. Every seminarian you support will provide the sacraments to someone who’s dying. Every seminarian you support provides respite to those of us who are working for the sick and the ill,’ Associate Professor Natasha Michael reminded the 478 guests who gathered on Friday 30 August at Moonee Valley Racecourse for this year’s Archbishop’s Dinner.
Dr Michael, a palliative care physician, academic and Associate Professor at the University of Notre Dame Australia, was the guest speaker at the flagship event of the Knights of the Southern Cross Victoria, which has been raising funds for the education of seminarians at Corpus Christi College, and for those studying to be chaplains for the Australian Defence Force, for almost a quarter of a century. This year, $88,000 was raised for the seminary, a record achievement for the annual event, which has now raised more than $1.6 million over its 24 years.
The evening began with Archbishop Peter A Comensoli saying grace and offering some reflections about his time in the Holy Lands in May. ‘I was there this year, and it struck me [that], in all the complexity and the difficulties, the tragedy and the great evils that are going on in the Holy Lands, … nonetheless, there’s great hope and gifts of life and creativity going on,’ he said, encouraging those present ‘to keep your prayer for the Holy Lands going’.
He also briefly mentioned a few of the exciting events and initiatives aimed at revitalising the life of the Archdiocese ‘in the life of Christ’ over the next few years, including the renewal of the Cathedral precinct through the ‘Light into the City’ project, local celebrations for Jubilee 2025, and the opportunity at the end of next year to welcome 12,000 young people from around Australia for the Australian Catholic Youth Festival (ACYF). These ‘seeds’, he said, ‘are the plantings that will come to fruit in due course’.
You matter because you are you, and you matter to the last moment of your life.
Over dinner, guests were entertained by a conversation between retired jockey Darren Gauci and emcee Bryan Martin OAM, a comedy sketch by seminarians, and a presentation by Brendan Hoy, General Manager, Client Services of the Catholic Development Fund (CDF), on CDF’s work within the wider Catholic community, before Dr Michael came to the podium to share insights from her career in palliative care.
Encouraging guests to give generously in support of seminarians, Dr Michaels observed that ‘it takes a longer to be a priest than it takes to be a doctor’ and said that in her 20 years as a palliative care doctor, ‘I’ve called on many, many priests, religious people, spiritual care providers to care for my patients when they’re anguished or as they approach death.’
In a moving speech that shared images and stories from her long and distinguished career in palliative medicine, Dr Michael paid tribute to all those who accompany the sick and dying, supporting and comforting them not only in their physical pain but also in their psychological and existential distress.
Modern palliative care, she said, takes the approach of ‘choosing to care for the whole person in their totality’. Outlining some of the history of this approach, she paid special tribute to the pioneering work of palliative care physician Dame Cecily Saunders, who emphasised the care of the patient rather than the disease in palliative care, and who famously said, ‘You matter because you are you, and you matter to the last moment of your life’—an attitude that has clearly influenced Dr Michael’s own approach to her work.
Among the stories she told was that of Pat Ryan, an elderly farmer she encountered in her twenties when working at a hospice in Limerick, Ireland. He had stopped speaking or engaging with his carers, and Dr Michaels was asked to help treat his depression.
She observed that every day he walked across the room he shared with three other patients and stood by the window looking out at the cattle in an adjoining field. Eventually she realised he was counting the cattle, just as he had done every morning of his working life on the farm. Simply moving his bed across to the window greatly improved his mood and quality of life.
When she asked if she could take his photo, he made a point of changing into a suit and tie, the only set of clothes he had brought with him from home. ‘In this little moment,’ she said, ‘we gave this man, Pat Ryan, his dignity.’
When babies are born into the world, we welcome them and accompany them. So as people leave the world, we do the same, we accompany them.
In recent years, she said, the greatest challenge in palliative care has been the introduction of voluntary assisted dying (VAD). With Prof David Kassan, she has produced the first Australian study seeking to understand why people seek VAD.
‘You think that it’s pain,’ she said, ‘but actually … they suffer existentially more than they suffer physically … It’s this psycho-existential distress of helplessness, pointlessness, hopelessness that drives a desire for death.’
An important focus of quality palliative care, then, is to promote ‘psycho-existential wellness’ she said.
‘I always say when babies are born into the world, we welcome them and accompany them. So as people leave the world, we do the same, we accompany them.’
Sometimes accompanying the dying might be as straightforward as giving them access to simple pleasures. She spoke, for instance, of how her favourite days are when of she is able to do her ward rounds on the veranda of the hospice, in the fresh air. ‘These beautiful nurses wheel the beds out. Hospices are beautiful for this reason. They allow these things to happen.’
As I get older, I’m not afraid of crying with my patients. Honest conversations and yet having the skill to maintain hope—these are skills that can be learnt and they can be developed. We are not angels. There’s nothing special about us. We are trained.
While there is very little palliative carers can do to cure their patients, she said, ‘we can do much when we accompany … We walk with [people], we lend solidarity, we counsel, we empower, and we don’t enable anything that we might conscientiously object to.
‘But this is only possible when there is shared vulnerability. As I get older, I’m not afraid of crying with my patients. Honest conversations and yet having the skill to maintain hope—these are skills that can be learnt and they can be developed. We are not angels. There’s nothing special about us. We are trained.’
Professional palliative carers are not the only ones who have a role to play, though, she said. In our parishes, we can help by ‘being communities of caring’ and by having the courage to engage in uncomfortable conversations about death and dying.
‘It’s very easy to stay in our echo chambers where we are comfortable,’ she said, but when we ‘step out of our comfort zone … there’s a lot you can do’.
Banner image: Associate Professor Natasha Michael speaks at the 2024 Archbishop’s Dinner. All photos by Frank Di Blasi, courtesy of the Knights of the Southern Cross Victoria.
