Is not life more?

September 1, 2007 by Pastor Dan.

Many of you know that I had surgery in June, to remove a cancer in my prostate gland. The full name was laparoscopic radical prostatectomy. After second and third opinions and lots of research, I came to the conclusion that removing the whole gland was my best choice.

As it turned out, the cancer had not spread outside the gland to surrounding tissue, so technically it means I am now cancer-free.

I was diagnosed as having this cancer in February.  After my learning curve leveled out a bit, I chose late June as a time when I could be more or less off my feet for as long as necessary. (It was after the Christopher Street West Pride events and before the ELCA’s Churchwide Assembly.)

In a little over four months, I went from not knowing I had a serious health problem to knowing I had cancer to being told that I am a cancer survivor.

None of this has really sunk in. Was it denial, or the steadfast faith that God would “fix” whatever was broken? Bedeviling my psychic and spiritual homework was the fact that throughout those months I felt terrific. The doctors called it asymptomatic. I didn’t feel any different than I did several years ago. I have all the mid-life aches and pains, none of which apparently had anything to do with the one thing that, if left untreated, would kill me. So while I was making major health inquiries and decisions, it was almost like it was on behalf of someone else—some sick person for whom I could have compassion. But me?

And now I am a cancer survivor almost never having been a cancer patient. Friends are still asking (you know, as an aside in a low tone of voice) what kind of treatments I am taking now. Well, folks, I’m not. It apparently is a done deal.

The loss of the prostate gland is, of course, a loss in both the procreational and recreational use of sexuality. Procreational:  I had to sign a consent form indicating that I understand I would be sterile after the surgery.  Recreational:  as a gay man, it obviously affects the quality of sexual expression.  (If you are a male, you have a 1 in 6 chance of developing prostate cancer, but even while you’re having your annual PSA blood test, take comfort in the fact that modern laparoscopic surgery is “nerve sparing.”  You can Google for plenty of information or start with the Prostate Cancer Foundation.)

It obviously affects my sex life.  But I am still alive.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?” – Jesus, in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 6:25.

Is not life more than food, drink, clothing and sex? For a lot of gay males, the implicit answer is no. Without food and drinks, sex and fashion, what else is there?

But even asking “is not life more?” has the look and feel of a pious platitude. I would be dishonest not to admit that the change (not total loss) of sexual function is unsettling and dismaying.  But as a survivor, I need to hear the implied question as from our Lord himself:  Is not life more than food, drink, clothing and sex?

Like the disease and the surgery, this too needs to “sink in.”  It is not a platitude, after all, when I find myself struggling with, praying about, meditating on a truth that had always seemed to be good advice for somebody else, for situations that had passed me by.  But I too am human, finite, selfish on bad days and thick-headed on good days.  I too need spiritual growth, to equip me to handle the things which life puts before me.  Is not life more?

—Pastor Dan Hooper, Los Angeles

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