A little less than a year before his death, Dietrich Bonhoeffer was in Tegel Military Prison, writing to his good friend Eberhard Bethge. Their letters are extraordinary, they might be my favorite thing of Bonhoeffer’s to read. They walk this incredible balance between theological reflection and simple companionship. I had a professor who would always note the tragedy of how many great theologians have guarded their writing from being infused with their personal spirituality, in favor of unambiguous clinical terms. Thankfully, we have so much writing from Bonhoeffer’s personal journey, to inform our understanding of his theology.
I was reading near the end of Letters and Papers from Prision. Bonhoeffer is writing a letter to Dietrich Wilhelm Rüdiger Bethge, a tiny babe, the first son of his protege and friend Eberhard, who married Bonhoeffer’s niece Renate. In a preceding letter he laments his imprisonment, not the conditions, but that he cannot fulfill Renate and Eberhard’s wish that Bonhoeffer would baptize little Dietrich. He sends them a few suggestions for scripture to read at the baptism…
You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus,
(2 Timothy 2:1 ESV)
My son, give me your heart,
and let your eyes observe my ways.
(Proverbs 23:26 ESV)
But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn,
which shines brighter and brighter until full day.
(Proverbs 4:18 ESV)
Reading the letters, Bonhoeffer comes off so gitty for them, about their child, and so hopeful for an impending faith in his life. He promises in another letter that he is still working on some sort of sermon/letter for the service. In May 1944, he pens a beautiful letter to the boy, starting it, “You are the first in a new generation for our family, and therefore the oldest representative of your generation.” He talks about how young Dietrich will meet his great-grandfather(Bonhoeffer’s father) and hear stories of the 19th century, while looking forward to possibly seeing the year 2000.
Bonhoeffer uses the span of these years to reflect on the changes in the world over the time and what it means to the Christian faith. He talks about how he is grateful that the boy will bear his name and that he is sad he could not be there for the Bethge’s wedding, his birth, and now baptism, because, as Bonhoeffer puts it so mildly, “he is at present sharing the fate of many good Germans and Protestant Christians.” In other words, Nazi imprisonment. The joy in the letter, reflecting on their family, the huge Bonhoeffer house (young Dietrich’s great-Grandparents house) where so many wonderful gatherings happened, and the hope that he will grow up with “soiled-hands” and a quiet learnedness before the Lord. He hopes for the family’s future, “Today salvation has come to this house.” (Luke 19:9 ESV) A few letters later, Bonhoeffer notes he is writing Eberhard on the day of the baptism, praying for the day, as he hears air-raid sirens outside. He prays an attack will not foil the event. The drama of the sirens, set against the image of a moment when a gentle little German baby is being sprinkled with the baptismal waters, is overwhelming.
I do not long for my son, the oldest representative of his new generation in the Pfeiffer family, to grow up in the chaotic violence of 1940’s Europe. I hope he will enjoy the “bulwark” as Bonhoeffer puts it, of a good home. At the same time, I hope Silas, who bears Dietrich as his middle-name, will have the paradoxical desire for wild abandon in the name of the Gospel.
So Silas is rolling onward in life, day 4 is almost in the books, here are some thoughts on the past days. Things are going pretty well. The second morning in the hospital, Saturday the 12th, we had our first man-time. We had a stroll through the 3rd floor of Forsyth, I sipped on coffee…he slept, the whole time. I daydreamed about future man-time, where I will explain to him the importance of a man having a dog (as he and I do in Piper) and why fire is awesome. Later in the day we saw our friends Chris and Sheri, whose son Jude was born on May 9th. Sheri leaned over to her son, hinting his eyeline toward Silas, and with impressive wit given the likely lack of sleep she quipped, “This is one of the only people in the world you are older than.”
My other favorite comment came from my sophomore roommate at CU, Jayson. Jayson was a frosh when we were randomly placed together in the Smith Hall. In one of his first days at college, he comfortably slept through the night. He settled right into the college experience, but his sophomore roommate was less adjusted. I stirred him from his slumber in the middle of the night, convinced an intruder had snuck in our second floor balcony door, passed our beds and subsequently posted up in my closet. I whispered, “Jayson, JAYSON, get your hockey stick, someone is in my closet.” He inquired a few times, “really?” and as he started to really listen to me, I realized how absurb my irrational fear was and just whispered back, “nevermind.” He commented on a picture I posted, “Congrats ole roomy! Hopefully you’ll handle the monsters in His closet better than that one in ours! Have fun!”
If you are curious, you can read about the Silas we named him after in Acts of the Apostles 15, 17, & 18. We pray our son would be a rebellious troublemaker for the Gospel:
[4] And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a great many of the devout Greeks and not a few of the leading women. [5] But the Jews were jealous, and taking some wicked men of the rabble, they formed a mob, set the city in an uproar, and attacked the house of Jason, seeking to bring them out to the crowd. [6] And when they could not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city authorities, shouting, “These men who have turned the world upside down have come here also, [7] and Jason has received them, and they are all acting against the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus.”
(Acts 17:4-7 ESV)
You can read about Silas’ middlename-sake, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, here. The picture above is a photo of Dietrich Bonhoeffer in my office, watching over Silas.
Silas’ mama is one prompt and organized lady. She very gracefully keeps her committments in order, so it is no surprise that Silas started to come on his due date. Erin came to visit me at Whole Foods, knowing I was antsy on the due date. At 3:30pm we sat at the counter looking out at the sunny May afternoon while I ate a quick salad. Erin was very uncomfortable, sensing the pregnancy was nearing its end, but not imminently. All of a sudden she felt a new tension, a contraction! Her water broke, but her contractions were inconsinstant and far apart. I walked her to her car, she refused to let me drive her home early and not finish the 2 hours of work I had left.
I kept my mind occupied cutting a huge wheel of Parmigiano-Reggiano, which is sort of like cheese surgery. With an hour left in my shift, Erin called my cell phone, but I could not pick up, so I asked her to text me or call the store. We agreed she’d call the store if it was an emergency. Turns out she called twice and was put on hold, without telling the person picking up, “I AM IN LABOR HERE!” She is very polite. It was a very sweet and midwestern thing to do to wait her turn in the order calls were received at Whole Foods Market Winston-Salem the afternoon of May 10th. All of a sudden, her contractions (90 minutes after the first one), were 4 minutes apart.
I rushed upstairs to tell some folks I was bolting. I hopped in my car and drove maniacally home, which is incredibly rare for me. I am, and I imagine my first born son will be, a follower of all reasonable rules, of which I include traffic laws. As soon as I got home, Erin was pacing in the kitchen, clearly working out the changes in her body. She looked graceful from that moment and has not ceased from being beautiful and natural through incredibly emotional and physical challenges. We pulled away from the house and our neighbor Shekia was pulling up. She is one enthused mother, so I yelled out the window as we passed “HAVIN’ A BABY HERE!” To which she responded with a huge smile and fist pump.
We pulled up to the hospital and we stood at the 4th floor front desk, waiting to admit her. Another young lady strolled up and said calmly, “they sent me home and told me to come back when it felt more consistent. Now it does, so I can stay?” Next to her, sat Erin, posted up in a wheel chair, in a full body marathon. Needless to say, Erin was convincing enough to get in first. They checked her and sure enough her water had broken and she was dilated 2cm. As that happened, Leslie, Erin’s best friend from college, maid of honor in our wedding, and an awesome nurse, walked up. With Hannah, our friend and doula en route from Chapel Hill, Erin’s mom Jean, and Leslie, we had the team almost assembled as we headed for the delivery room.
The room was so serene, with low lights, hard wood (ish?) floors, and lots of space. Erin’s mom Jean is a nurse, Leslie is a nurse, and Hannah is a doula and lactation consultant, so my role was primarily snack getter, massage giver, and DJ. Erin worked her heart out, her contractions were coming so fast, which you will see the fruit of as the story goes on. Hannah arrived at 6:45pm and the ladies discussed if it was time for an epidural. On a side note, as a passionate observer of communities, it is clear to me that our society has lost the feminine bond in child birth. Our experience was unique and compelled me to realize how much child birth is something so uniquely feminine and requires men to really encourage the women of a community to work together in a birth. Along with our crew, the nurse and delivering Doctor were women. I understood the importance of these dynamics beforehand because Erin explained what she has observed beautifully with some women in other countries. But, also how men have really impeded that opportunity with their presence and opinions. I later quipped this reminded me of our church at times.
Erin opted for an epidural and Leslie stayed in the room with her. Jean, Hannah, and I went to the waiting room, where we all learned a new phrase. A mother was chasing a defiant toddler and looked at us saying, “I’ma have to beat him like its his birthday.” I thought, “hmm, Silas’ birthday will be different than at your household.” And also, “what the heck do you do for birthdays at your household?!?” When we came back in, it was around 9pm and Erin was checked at 5cm. We guessed things would slow with the epidural, though Hannah said she was given a conservative dose, so it may not slow much or fully limit Erin’s ability to feel and progress.
Erin was given penicillin, which she described as “a burning hot anvil crushing your arm.” So she was really never free of pain in the process. Around 10:30pm, Leslie ran home and we decided to get some rest. By the way, Leslie gave birth to her daughter Ansley a week earlier, so she is amazing to balance feeding a newborn, recovering from child birth, and supporting her friend in labor. We rested our eyes, though when not catching a quick cat nap, I was pacing on my toes in the room, in the hallway, in the bathroom. I was not nervous really, especially surrounded by so many knowledgable women. I was just impatient to meet my son and for my wife to move past the pain. Around 1:30am, the nurse came in and checked on our slumbering bunch. Erin was resting and Jean and Hannah had thankfully fallen asleep for a brief moment…they both were so physically active every other moment. Right then Leslie texted to see if she should head back. The nurse checked a drowsy Erin and was silent after. Erin assumed this meant no progress, but I saw Rhonda (that’s the nurse) had a smirk on her face. She was 10 cm. I woke up the crew, apparently in a hilariously professional fashion, saying, “Umm, ladies, you may want to wake-up now.” We texted Leslie, “good timing, get on down here!” I kept thinking of Bruce Willis in Ocean’s 12, when Julia Roberts fakes going into labor and he says, “Uhh, Doctor, you may want to call the rice paddy.”
Rhonda was prepping the room, we put on Bach’s Cello Suite and we read Psalm 20. Rhonda had Erin do a few practice pushes. In true Erin fashion, she was focused, determined, athletic, so Rhonda just kept her pushing, shortly thereafter calling the Doctor. The Doctor came up and Erin just kept pushing, mind you we have been at the hospital for 8 hours, she started labor 10 hours before. She was focused, pushing, focused and pushing. So in the zone, Rhonda paused her, took her hand and without saying anything placed it on Silas’ crowning head, which brought a tear to Erin’s eye and clearly brought out what her Harvard friends called, “Martha!” Martha is Erin’s first name, and her grad school friends use Martha when Erin’s determined and competitive alter-ego emerges. She was determined to meet her son, focused, pushing, focused, pushing, eyes closed, crunched forward. Her mom put so much energy into helping, holding her leg as she labored on her side and feeding her ice chips. Leslie spoke sweet encouragments and shot photos, and Hannah coached Erin and explained to me even the most elementary things, which I couldn’t understand. She kept sprinting on, Erin has always favored sprinting over endurance. All of a sudden, eyes closed, focused, Dr. Hatch said to her, “Erin look,” which she did not, “ERIN LOOK!” and his face was out. With one big push he came to live on this earth at 2:35am! I turned up the music and we listened to “All Things Bright and Beautiful”, praising God as we all hummed or sang along, including some of the staff.
His eyes were so bright and observant, everyone commented. He was placed right on Erin’s chest and he stared so intensely into her eyes. It was like you could see dust particles between their gazes, the way light comes in through blinds and a beam draws a line from the window to the floor. My first thought was adoption. We have been trying to adopt and our closest friends are raising adopted children. What a tragic world we live in where that fettered gaze is unlinked. Thankfully, people choose to raise those children out of whatever circumstances broke the gaze. I thought to myself then, it was God’s willingness and Christ’s too, to let that gaze be broken between them, Father and child, so that we might see God’s shining face as he intended when he created us. The way Silas looked at Erin must be a mere hint of what Moses’ face looked like when he asked the Lord, “Show Me Your Glory.”
He was weighed and measured…7lbs. 11 oz., 21 inches, a surprisingly average sized baby from the ingredients of Erin & Austin. We will see if that lasts. We moved to our room, Erin and Silas in a wheel chair, me looking like Clark Griswold with a cart full of luggage, a purse, a camera bag, and a birth ball. We exitted the elevator to the 3rd floor and exhaustingly/excitedly anticipated our first moment just the three of us. But wait, the nurse stopped us at the nursery and asked us to hand him over for a few hours! We had no idea this was coming and they took him behind the glass. We stood their, so tired, and both teared up. Like in Raising Arizona, we felt like Ed, “I LOVE HIM SOOO MUCHHH,” and H.I., “What? Are You Kiddin? We got a family here!”
We slumbered a few hours before his return. At least thats what I tell myself, but I know Erin merely shut her eyes, thinking incessantly about her son.
So Silas is rolling onward in life, day 4 is almost in the books, here are some thoughts on the past days. Things are going pretty well. The second morning in the hospital, Saturday the 12th, we had our first man-time. We had a stroll through the 3rd floor of Forsyth, I sipped on coffee…he slept, the whole time. I daydreamed about future man-time, where I will explain to him the importance of a man having a dog (as he and I do in Piper) and why fire is awesome. Later in the day we saw our friends Chris and Sheri, whose son Jude was born on May 9th. Sheri leaned over to her son, hinting his eyeline toward Silas, and with impressive wit given the likely lack of sleep she quipped, “This is one of the only people in the world you are older than.”
austin pfeiffer 
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