It was called Roman Nose State Park, named after an Indian Chief who had a Roman nose. I didn’t make that up. Below you will find a bio on Henry Roman Nose.
I call it a rescue. That is probably a little dramatic, but there is some truth in it. Just days after I arrived in OKC to begin serving the parish in a suburb, the funerals started. A number of the leading members of the congregation during my first few weeks there died. The intense Pastoral care began. That congregation taught me about Christian community, actually caring for others. I did funerals for older adults, teen agers, babies, some via natural causes, some accidents, some violent deaths. I still cherish a Pastoral stole given to me by a family who lost little Hillary just before she was due.
Doing Pastoral Care demands being on call 24/7 year round. It was the most taxing and the most satisfying of the ministries in my portfolio. One year there were a cluster of four funerals and a wedding in the span of two weeks including Christmas and New Year’s Day (the Groom chose that day so that he could remember their anniversary). Without the addition of those Pastoral Care tasks, the Christmas season stretches most Pastors right up to the limit of their strength and stamina.
The combination of work demands and concern for what Mary Ann had to deal with took a toll. Here is where Roman Nose comes into the picture. One October, a Pastors’ Conference was approaching. In the Oklahoma District the clergy were generally a pretty relaxed and congenial crew. There would be time to relax and enjoy the Park, Roman Nose State Park. The need for Pastoral Care intervened as a family lost a Loved One. My hope was always to provide a healing presence to the degree possible.
Realizing that I would miss the break at the conference, I called to see if I could still get the group rate and just go on a Personal Retreat during the two days following the Conference. The congregation Leadership fully supported that option. I spent two days walking and reading and sitting and climbing and sitting and walking and reading all over the hills and valleys and bluffs of Roman Nose State Park. I climbed over fences and through tangled brush in gullies. I checked out the “healing tree” inside a protective fenced area, a place sacred to the Cheyenne who had lived there.
The place was a place of healing for me. I can still picture the view as I sat at the very top of one of the taller hills, overlooking two small lakes. A powerful Oklahoma wind was blowing in my face. The sun was bright, the sky was crystal clear, the air crisp and fresh. I felt what I would come to feel many times thereafter as I continued to go on Personal Retreats, relishing the solitude. I felt whole, an intentional creation of a Someone who was providing me at that moment with the breath of life. There was no distance between me and that Someone.
I had found great strength in Spiritual Formation activities during the years in the Kansas City area. The Rescue at Roman Nose opened a new chapter in that Spiritual Formation.
Then came an experience that drew John and I together, finding strength in a regular time of Spiritual partnering and prayer as he ministered to his wife Sherrie through the last leg of her journey here. I talked about Mary Ann and my journey and he talked about his and Sherrie’s. The strength and courage of Sherrie became a source of strength for an entire congregation. When I visited her, there would be a circle of three or four, maybe six or eight people in their living room. She gave infinitely more than she received from all of us who gathered. My ministry was profoundly impacted by Sherrie and John.
I can’t remember how I found out about it, but I am grateful that I did. When we began taking Youth on Confirmation Retreats, DCE John and I took them a place called St. Francis of the Woods. I have described it in great detail in earlier posts. It has become a place of respite and Spiritual Renewal for me. When I first went on a Personal Retreat there, the suggested contribution for a day and night’s stay in a two bedroom fully furnished cabin was $6. There would be a loaf of home made bread waiting each time I arrived for a retreat.
Most of the times I went, I stayed two nights and walked for part of one day, a full day and part of a third day. I read and walked and sat and did all the things I had done at Roman Nose. The Orthodox Chapel, the woods and fields, 500 acres of working farm provided a rich environment for Spiritual Renewal. Each time went I encountered that same healing recognition of being the intentional creation of Someone who chooses that I exist.
During my last two years in ministry in the OKC area, I attended two Spiritual Formation Groups (one each year) that followed the Shalem format. The series was led by a local Pastor and Counselor who had been trained in the approach. It involved a time of silent meditation, a time of journaling, and time for each person to share as they felt appropriate.
The Oklahoma years were an important time in providing a lab for learning to do Pastoral Care in a meaningful way, and providing a pattern of Spiritual Formation that provided the resources necessary to deal with the Bombing and Lee’s death as well as all that life had yet in store for Mary Ann and me.
Addendum:
Chief Roman Nose lived in this rugged canyon from 1887 until he died there in 1917. He was born in 1856 and given the name Woquini meaning “Hook Nose”. He grew to manhood within a hostile environment involving many Cheyenne raiding parties. In 1875 all warring Cheyennes returned to the agency at Darlington. Here he was arrested and sent to Ft. Marion in St. Augustine, Florida where he learned to speak, read and write the English language. He was then moved to an Institute in Virginia. Here he accepted the Christian faith and was baptized Henry Caruthers Roman Nose. His name Henry came from Richard Henry Pratt, the commander of the fort in St. Augustine. His name Caruthers came from Mrs. Horace Caruthers, his devoted teacher and friend in Florida. He learned tinsmith at a boarding school in Pennsylvania before returning to his homeland in 1881. Roman Nose discovered much had changed during the six years he had been away. Traditional Indian ways were almost nonexistent. White domination permeated all aspects of Indian life. Slowly he became disillusioned with what the whites offered. Roman Nose eventually spurned the white society. He left the agency and took his family to live in what is now Roman Nose State Park.
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