Beth's all-time favorite Bible verse is John 3:16. "I always knew that, one, I was loved and, two, that I was forgiven. I had those two things with me because I was raised in the church. But our world today is very challenging to the soul. My mom always said that you want to have a lot of faith going into bad times, because when you need it is not a good time to try to find it!"
She grew up in Stanhope United Methodist Church, where she sang in the choirs that her mother directed and served as the youth representative on the administrative board. Her father, a house painter, and her mother, an office manager, had four daughters who grew up to be a minister, a school teacher, and a nurse. Beth, the youngest, is an MD, an anesthesiologist at Princeton Medical Center. After graduating from Rutgers' Douglass College and medical school, she did a residency in internal medicine, a fellowship in critical care, and a second residency in anesthesia.
Beth is active in the church, playing the piano for the "Heart of our Faith" Sunday School class, ringing for the bell choir, helping with youth activities, and serving on the adult education committee. She has taught Sunday School, and she taught Vacation Bible School for five summers, taking a week's vacation each time. She and her husband, Dave, an ophthalmologist with Princeton Eye Group, host the annual church picnic at their Hopewell farm.
Like her mother, she likes to make use of every minute. "I remember my mother coming home and starting to work around the house and an hour later she would still have her coat on, saying she was too busy to take it off. My mom had a very strong personality, very stoic, not a complainer, not a gossiper. She was a doer."
Beth's mother passed away when she was pregnant with Kate and Daniel (now 14) was a baby. "I was very angry, because she was not going to be able to share an important part of my life with me and my family." A pastoral counseling session helped her to know that being angry was OK, and that questioning her faith was OK.
"But my mom never accepted her death," says Beth. "I don't think most people can." When Rev. Peggy was diagnosed with cancer, and Beth served as her medical advocate, Beth discovered how different the end-of-life experience can be. "The good part was that Peggy was able to accept her death and thereby resolve it with her family. My mom was never able to say goodbye to me and my sisters. Through Peggy, I realized the significance of that. Peggy not only lived her faith, she died with it. She was gracious to the end."
People nearing the end of their lives can provide an example for the rest of us, says Beth. "It gave me a different perspective, for when it comes my time, or when I see other people who are dying. I learned time shouldn't be spent trying to avoid it, that you need to spend the time you have left, sharing. You don't really say the things you need to say until you have no time left. The time Peggy had with her family gave them a lot of strength and Peggy a lot of peace."
"Even in the face of death, Peggy truly just kept saying she had been so blessed. And then I would walk away and see everything I had, including a future (which is something we assume) and I would realize how blessed I am. God -- through my family, and the people I have met along the way -- has given me a good sense of what's right and what He wants. My task is to live my life as an example. That's the best I can do.
