Gifts from the heart

By Barbara Sofer
Sep. 18, 2003

A lot can go wrong in life. A ladder is rickety, (see the Talmud, Kiddushin 39b ) and someone falls. A single cell goes off course within the complex wonder of the human body. A terrorist murders innocent people.

Those of us who live in Jerusalem - the city targeted by the forces of evil because of its historic symbolism - are feeling increasingly at risk. The vulnerability dovetails with the awesome High Holy days theme of judgment, and darkens our table talk. We wonder aloud what lies ahead.

That the children in the cancer word at Hadassah Hospital are mourning all this week underlines this theme for me. Kids with cancer - now there's a subject that strains our sense of justice. Even infants are born with cancer. Treatment is long and difficult. Imagine watching your siblings play outdoors as you undergo chemotherapy and bone marrow transplantation, always within the shadow of a malady so feared that many call it only "that disease," always whispered.

Most of us don't like to think about such difficult subjects, or see sick children, but there are a few select souls able to bring comfort to those children amid their illness, their fear, their agonizing treatment.

Giving children hope for the future requires a gift of kindness. Those able to do it have an extra measure of benevolence and a generous heart that overcomes fear and repugnance in order to relieve the anguish of others. These agents of the Creator are indeed "compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abundant in kindness and truth."

In the past month, the sick children in the cancer ward at Hadassah Hospital have lost two such angels of mercy.

Dina Goldstein was 19, a National Service volunteer, when she became a teacher in the hospital classroom, where small patients try to keep up with schooling through long hospitalizations. Dina taught Hebrew and English and Math and art, and even cooked with sick kids to boost their faltering appetites. Never in front of the children did she let down her guard. Only at home did she weep over their suffering.

Then one day Lee, a young, dark-haired physician from England, came to volunteer too with the children in his spare time. He fell in love with the teacher while they did arithmetic and baked cookies. The children weren't too young to miss the fairytale quality of this love story.

One of their post-wedding, sheva brachot parties was held right in the hospital.

Then, Dina, the young bride, a prizewinning student of physics, was diagnosed with the very disease that afflicted most of her young charges. She fought her own brave battle with the illness, but died a few weeks ago.

Nava Applebaum lived in the same Jerusalem neighborhood, Old Katamon, as Dina, and went to the same high school, Horev. Nava did her volunteer National Service through Zichron Menachem, an organization named for a child who died of cancer. In his memory, an entire cadre of dedicated volunteers work to lighten the suffering of children. These young helpers aren't doctors or medics. What they have to give sick children comes from their hearts, not from medicine.

Nava's gift of time and caring and fun and listening and love endeared her to each of the children. How excited they were to be invited to her wedding. The bride phoned all the children to make sure they knew the invitation was real. How could she dance at her wedding without them?

One little girl was simply too sick to get out of bed. Never mind, comforted Nava. She promised to come to the hospital wearing that beautiful white dress even before she went to the wedding hall. The most important day of her life would begin with this special act of kindness inside a cancer ward.

The kids could hardly wait as the day of Nava's wedding approached.

Then, by the morning of the wedding, somehow they had all heard the shocking news. Evil had once again entered their world. A terrorist had murdered their bride and her father, Dr. David Applebaum.

Ironically, inside the cancer ward the only enemy is the dread disease. Boys and girls, Jews and Arabs - it's hard to distinguish when the kids are bald and wearing pajamas, and when they're all weeping.

"Repentance, prayer and charity ameliorates the harsh decree," we shout to the heavens in the High Holy day liturgy. We admit our faults and promise to be better. We intensify our prayers. We write checks to charities.

But still we worry. If the harsh decree couldn't be evaded for near-perfect beings like Dina and Nava, how will it be for us? We feel inadequate. The grief is overwhelming, the trepidation immense. Is there one of us who has not felt that way over the past weeks?

Repentance, prayer and charity. We cannot control or understand heavenly judgment, but what we can do is make these words of our lips count on this earth. Repentance must include a determination to use the time allotted us for good. How can we remember Dina and Nava, blessed with hesed, lovingkindness, without recognizing the need to increase our own reservoir of kindness?

Prayer is the opportunity to move closer to the Creator, as we struggle to find meaning in the events around us. That doesn't mean imposing sophomoric explanations for suffering, but bringing ourselves into a more intimate partnership so our lives have more meaning. Prayer must contain within it an effort to align ourselves with the forces of good.

Will charity avert our own stern decree? We can't know. But the charity - those checks we write now, be they for organizations like Zichron Menachem or for research to eradicate disease - can avert the decree for others. In developed countries like our own, 75% of children with cancer will recover as a result of research and improved treatment developed over the past two decades. Before that, only 25% survived.

We can't rest until every sick child can be cured, until every child is safe. Our command is to perfect this world. We will need inspiration and determination to fight all our enemies, and we will need Divine help to defeat them.