What is the Pace of Love? Timefullness in Emergency Care
Jackson McNeece and Phifer Nicholson, Duke University, Durham, NC
Japanese theologian Kosuke Koyama’s framework of the “three-mile-an-hour God” reimagined a theology of time, efficiency, and discipleship through the lens of a human’s average walking speed. Given that God is a God of love who became human in Christ, three miles an hour becomes, to Koyama, “the speed of love.” In Becoming Friends of Time, disability theologian and nurse John Swinton employs this theological imaginary when engaging with the practice of modern biomedicine.[1]
In doing so, Swinton recalls a conversation with a physician friend about Koyama’s concept of the three-mile-an-hour God. The friend remarked “Well, I reckon in my job that I have to walk at around six miles per hour!” Swinton’s tongue-in-cheek response was “Who are you following?” Later in the chapter, Swinton points to an exchange with another physician, Lydia Dugdale, who similarly pushed back against this formulation of time, arguing that “Since God is outside of time, I am convinced that he can run with me while I am running.” In response, Swinton acquiesces that sometimes humans must move faster than three miles an hour, but it is necessary to remember that, as both Swinton and Koyama contend, three miles an hour is an average speed.
We find this theological imaginary to hold promise, but have important questions about some of its ramifications for medical practitioners, particularly those chaplains, nurses, physicians, and surgeons who work in emergency and trauma care – a world that often necessitates a swift pace in order to offer the best possible care to patients. Thus, we find ourselves at our central question: if Swinton asserts love can only be administered at a slow, measured speed, can a medical professional care well for patients in a state of urgency?
As a medical student and chaplain, we wish to advance this question: how fast does God move in the emergency care? Life in the Emergency Department constantly operates at max capacity, not because Emergency Medicine and Acute Surgery teams wish to — they often must. Life hangs in the balance of seconds and wasting time can result in morbidity and mortality. We propose it can be the case that we can love our patients whom we encounter and — despite the pace and brevity of the encounter — accompany them through potentially the worst day of their lives.
To explore a theology of offering love and attention to those that pass us by, the authors of this paper will first propose a vignette of a trauma patient encounter within the Emergency Department. We will then use this encounter to nuance Kosuke Koyama and John Swinton’s framework of a three-mile-an-hour God within a medical context, which will turn into a constructive account of love in the trauma and emergency care. Finally, we will explore the promise of the three-mile-an-hour God in the practice of medicine and surgery, bringing its critique to bear on a discipline often characterized by significant fear and anxiety.
[1] John Swinton, Becoming Friends of Time: Disability, Timefullness, and Gentle Discipleship, Studies in Religion, Theology, and Disability (Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2018).
In doing so, Swinton recalls a conversation with a physician friend about Koyama’s concept of the three-mile-an-hour God. The friend remarked “Well, I reckon in my job that I have to walk at around six miles per hour!” Swinton’s tongue-in-cheek response was “Who are you following?” Later in the chapter, Swinton points to an exchange with another physician, Lydia Dugdale, who similarly pushed back against this formulation of time, arguing that “Since God is outside of time, I am convinced that he can run with me while I am running.” In response, Swinton acquiesces that sometimes humans must move faster than three miles an hour, but it is necessary to remember that, as both Swinton and Koyama contend, three miles an hour is an average speed.
We find this theological imaginary to hold promise, but have important questions about some of its ramifications for medical practitioners, particularly those chaplains, nurses, physicians, and surgeons who work in emergency and trauma care – a world that often necessitates a swift pace in order to offer the best possible care to patients. Thus, we find ourselves at our central question: if Swinton asserts love can only be administered at a slow, measured speed, can a medical professional care well for patients in a state of urgency?
As a medical student and chaplain, we wish to advance this question: how fast does God move in the emergency care? Life in the Emergency Department constantly operates at max capacity, not because Emergency Medicine and Acute Surgery teams wish to — they often must. Life hangs in the balance of seconds and wasting time can result in morbidity and mortality. We propose it can be the case that we can love our patients whom we encounter and — despite the pace and brevity of the encounter — accompany them through potentially the worst day of their lives.
To explore a theology of offering love and attention to those that pass us by, the authors of this paper will first propose a vignette of a trauma patient encounter within the Emergency Department. We will then use this encounter to nuance Kosuke Koyama and John Swinton’s framework of a three-mile-an-hour God within a medical context, which will turn into a constructive account of love in the trauma and emergency care. Finally, we will explore the promise of the three-mile-an-hour God in the practice of medicine and surgery, bringing its critique to bear on a discipline often characterized by significant fear and anxiety.
[1] John Swinton, Becoming Friends of Time: Disability, Timefullness, and Gentle Discipleship, Studies in Religion, Theology, and Disability (Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2018).