As reported in the Valley News, Dartmouth Health has laid off 75 of its 10,000 workers in a cost-saving move (“DH lays off 75, cuts 100 unfilled jobs,” June 10). One casualty was chaplain Frank Macht, head of “Spiritual Health,” an inspired teacher to many, including myself.
However painful, it is, of course, logical that a hospital in financial distress would value the practicalities of medical treatment above something so vague as “spiritual health.” And, of course, those medical procedures are what insurance is inclined to reward. Who, after all, can measure one word of thoughtfulness, attach value to an hour of quiet presence? Is it covered? No way.
But, in the moment, my inclination is to cancel health insurance altogether. How much have I paid and never used; all because of fear that something might happen?
Let’s face it: Somebody is making a lot of money off of what? The fear of death, yours and mine.
Life and death: the basic paradox. How to make sense of it? How do we make peace with it? I know what you are thinking: “It’s a spiritual question.” Quick! Get to the hospital (any hospital)! Rescue those unemployed chaplains!
Gendo Allyn Field
Lebanese
Dartmouth Health “relief chaplain”
Each day we read about more and more fear in the news:
■Fear that our children will have access to books that will give them inappropriate ideas
■Fear that our children will learn parts of the history of their country that might make them feel guilty
■Fear that banning AR-15s and high-capacity magazines will mean the government will ban all guns
■Fear that if our children are exposed to drag shows it could lead to child abuse
■Fear that if LGBTQ people are discussed in schools it will influence the sexuality and gender-preference of our children
■Fear that people who are LGBTQ will not get to heaven because they are not saved.
What if we choose to live a life based on faith and not fear?
■Faith that the values we teach to our children as parents will help them grow with a strong compass that will allow them to make up their own minds
■Faith that our children can handle uncomfortable truths about their county’s history
■Faith that the Second Amendment is strongly defended by our Supreme Court, and that protecting our neighbors and children from being killed in an easy fashion by specific firearms does not mean that we will lose our handguns, shotguns and rifles
■Faith in the truth that while there have been an amount of priests, Scout leaders and coaches who have abused our children, there is no proof that drag queens have done the same
■Faith that although we have been surrounded by LGBTQ people our entire lives, we each have been led by strong biological attractions and gender identifications that could not be directed by anyone
■Faith to believe that people are led to Gd as called, surrounded by unconditional love.
Choose faith.
Barry Wenig
Lebanese
There has to be an immediate ban on all pizzas statewide, due to its baking causing “Global Warming”!
If propane pilots are causing asthma, just imagine tens of thousands of pizza ovens, in the US, just pumping out asthma/cancer-causing fumes! To make matters worse, the pizza is covered with cheese, the production of which is causing unsafe levels of methane, and the pepperoni is just loaded with red dye, another carcinogen!
And, how about all the dough, causing diabetes! Oh, and that hot Italian sausage, causing ulcers! And who would like to support an Italian business that is racist using white flour …
The lunatic left greenies will not stop until they are removed from the public office.
Jim Argentati
Lymes
There are many issues that plague the average American, the middle class, and average Americans, including people right here in our New Hampshire communities. Poverty, addiction, lack of health care access (including mental health care), generational trauma, inadequate and unfair education funding, low wages, medical and student debt, and unaffordable child care are the main ones that come to mind.
But how much do you hear corporate media, such as MSNBC, CNN and Fox News, talk about these issues? Slim to none. Even our community discourse neglects to include real discussions.
I blame both sides of the political spectrum for this. Sad to say, post-pandemic these problems have gotten even worse. While the rich continue to get richer, and income and wealth inequality continues to worsen. Even a president who was elected to address these issues made it worse due to the debt ceiling “compromise.”
We have become numb to these issues. My belief is that it is by design to focus on political gossip, and not the root issues of the problems we face in New Hampshire and people around the country face — in order for the rich to keep going to the bank, and to the common people people to keep getting crushed.
Matt Bean
Claremont