Praying for Matt

Wow, what a week.

Last week started out as normal as can be. I was writing papers and preparing for and taking midterm exams.

On Thursday that all changed. When I got done at the library a little before 4:30 I was looking forward to a night of cramming for my medieval philosophy exam when I got a phone call. I answered it and was surprised that the first words out of the guys mouth were, “Adam, have you heard the news?” Needless to say, that got my attention. When my friend on the phone told me that another of my close friends had been working out and had a heart attack I think I swore at him that you shouldn’t kid about something like that… sadly he wasn’t.

Matt, one of my Diocesan Brothers (what we call others from the same diocese) had been working out on the exercise bike when he just fell over with no pulse and no breathing. He doesn’t work out real, hard, he even reads while working out so it seemed particularly odd. Thank God that there were others down in the workout room while he was there, we have all been talking about how often we are alone down there, depending on our schedules.

One guy immediately started CPR while another ran to get help, from the school nurse and calling 911. As Grace would have it the one going to get help ran into a seminarian who had been a doctor before starting here, and he grabbed the AED off the wall and went down. The doctor had just happened to get out of class early at that time. Matt had to be shocked twice with the seminaries AED and once with the paramedic’s AED here and then twice again at the hospital. The paramedics were here very quickly since the fire station is close by.

In addition to immediately starting CPR and sending the doctor down a priest was sent down to perform Anointing of the Sick, one of the sacraments of the Church. This sacrament is often called “Last Rites” but that is a secular misnomer. Anointing of the Sick is for healing as well as a blessing at the time of death, whichever way God wills it. It is simply a sacrament of God’s Grace. This would have been a part of a total of last rites given at the bedside of a dying person, along with a final sacrament of Reconciliation and a final reception of the Eucharist. That is why society misunderstands this sacrament.

Prayers for Matt started immediately, a group of seminarians were praying the rosary in the hallway as the paramedics were working on Matt. All of us took a break from whatever we were doing to say a prayer for him. We were all calling people, e-mailing people, and posting to our Facebook pages asking for prayers for Matt. Through connections that I’m not sure that I follow how they all happened Matt was an intention in the Mass offered by the Pope on Friday morning. Matt has been in seminary at various levels for a long time, so he has many connections. A Cardinal from the Vatican called the hospital to get an update on Matt, so prayers were very abundant.

I went over to the hospital at about 6:30 Thursday evening and was able to see Matt in his room in the ICU at about 8:40. He had been put into an induced coma so that his body wouldn’t be straining while trying to recover.

I saw him a couple of more times on Friday while trying to also go about a somewhat normal day. Friday evening we had a special holy hour for praying for Matt. The vocation director, Fr. Hirsch, from the La Crosse Diocese came down to lead that. We were told on Friday that at about midnight they would start trying to bring Matt out of the coma.

On Saturday morning I went over to the hospital and while pulling up in my truck I saw Matt’s mom walking in. I asked her how he was doing and immediately knew that it hadn’t gone well. The doctors hadn’t liked what they saw in Matt’s numbers so they put him back into the coma. I didn’t go see him then because I figured it was best for just his family to be with him. The same thing happened once more on Saturday. Sunday morning they were able to bring Matt out of the coma.

When I went over on Sunday I was told that he had been able to flutter open his eyes, but not keep them open. Another La Crosse seminarian and I went into the room and talked to Matt a bit, but he didn’t wake up so we went to just praying silently. After a while he opened his eyes. We talked to him for a minute about how well he was doing before telling him to go back to sleep and rest. A while later one of Matt’s good friends came in and woke Matt up on purpose. He had him try to squeeze his hand, and he could do it!! He could only do it with one hand due to swelling, but it was very exciting. The next thing he asked Matt to try was to wiggle the toes on one food. He could do that, and even follow directions of right and left. I was so overjoyed to see that.

After that it has been a steady rise up for Matt. They pulled out the ventilator tube and the first question out of his mouth was, “Can I still be a priest?” Because he is more alert now, but still weak they are asking for no visitors. Matt is the kind of guy that won’t rest when people are there because he wants to entertain them… so it is good to avoid it and let him rest.

Tonight we had a scheduled address by the formation dean here. Instead of that he brought in the chief nurse from the ICU to talk about Matt (with the family’s permission). She said that his recovery so far has been the best she’s seen in 34 years of nursing and truly gives the prayer credit for that. She was very excited at the way that this all is going. Tonight Matt is scheduled to be moved from ICU to a regular room. They will see where it goes from there if he can go home or has to go to a rehab center.

Matt is by no means fully recovered yet so any prayers are appreciated. But at the greatness of his recovery we can sure see that the prayers so far are being answered.

Peace,
Adam