John's time as a student chaplain at a children's hospital (c. 2000)
story · status: told 6× · last event: mentioned (2026-08-03)
In 2000, while at divinity school planning to become an Episcopal minister, John worked for a few months as a student chaplain at a children's hospital; the suffering he saw ended those plans and lay behind The Fault in Our Stars. He returns to it again and again in videos from 2012 to 2026, often recalling his supervisor's advice: "Don't just do something. Stand there."
About: University of Chicago Divinity School
| date | event | what | video |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2011-06-20 | first in the videos (retold; it began earlier) | A decade ago John worked as a chaplain at a children's hospital, and he was briefly enrolled in, though never attended, the University of Chicago's divinity school. | On Religion 00:00:10 |
| 2012-01-10 (said on 2012-01-09, implied) (happened 2000) | told | John says that almost twelve years ago (c. 2000) he worked as a student chaplain at a children's hospital, the experience behind TFIOS. · also in: TAKE IT DOWN A NOTCH | The Fault in Our Stars 00:00:28 |
| 2013-01-15 | retold | John retells his six months as a student chaplain at a children's hospital at 22, where suffering children left him angry and hopeless. | An Evening of Awesome at Carnegie Hall 00:50:10 |
| 2020-01-28 | mentioned | John says he has worked in a children's hospital and held the hands of children as they died. | Looking Away (Again) 00:01:51 |
| 2020-12-31 | retold | When people we love suffer we want to make it better, but often we can't; John recalls his supervisor's words when he was a student chaplain at a children's hospital. · also in: We're here because were here., John's Review of Auld Lang Syne | Auld Lang Syne: The Anthropocene Reviewed 00:14:56 |
| 2021-05-25 (happened 2000) | retold | In 2000 John worked for a few months as a student chaplain at a children's hospital while at divinity school planning to become an Episcopal minister; the devastation he saw ended those plans, and he still can't handle it. | The Anthropocene Reviewed, Animated 00:03:26 |
| 2022-03-29 | mentioned | John recalls choosing not to go to divinity school after working as a hospital chaplain, the word hermeneutics being one reason. (playful) | An H of G 00:00:00 |
| 2022-05-03 | retold | Half his life ago John worked as a student chaplain at a children's hospital and saw what he considers obscene: children dying, parents terrified for their kids and about paying medical bills. | My Religion and My Banned Books 00:00:00 |
| 2023-05-23 | mentioned | John has seen illness and humor coexist many times: as a chaplain, as a child, and during his own serious health problems. | Rough Week 00:01:08 |
| 2025-11-04 | mentioned | John recalls being a hospital chaplain over half his life ago, the start of his obsession with why suffering is unjustly distributed. | The Real Question 00:00:00 |
| 2026-02-14 | mentioned | John says that when he was a chaplain he was consumed by superstition, which was ironic because his Christianity was supposed to be against superstition. | Project for Awesome 2026 part 3! 01:56:59 |
| 2026-08-03 | mentioned | Nor can John reconcile himself to the deaths of Esther, Amy, or the kids he met in the hospital over half his life ago. | Esther Day 2026: Some Thoughts on Loss 00:02:13 |
Dates are upload dates, which set the order. Where the speaker gives a different recording date in the video, it is added as "said on YYYY-MM-DD, implied" (derived from the date said in the video).
What is said about it
11 statements, by date (the events above are the turns of the thread; these are the details).
- 2012-01-10 (said on 2012-01-09, implied) · The Fault in Our Stars — John says TFIOS grew from his work almost twelve years ago as a student chaplain at a children's hospital; he has been trying ever since to write a funny, honest story about it. — 00:00:28 · also in: TAKE IT DOWN A NOTCH
- 2013-01-15 · An Evening of Awesome at Carnegie Hall — John says at 22, accepted to the University of Chicago divinity school, he first spent six months as a children's hospital chaplain, where many sick kids died. — 00:50:10
- 2013-01-15 · An Evening of Awesome at Carnegie Hall — John says faced with children's needless suffering he felt only anger and hopelessness, so he was a bad chaplain except to kids with game consoles, whom he could play at Mario Kart. — 00:50:53
- 2020-01-28 · Looking Away (Again) — John says most mothers who die in childbirth there die for want of an ambulance ride, a blood transfusion or an emergency C-section: these deaths are preventable and have been for decades. — 00:02:20
- 2020-01-28 · Looking Away (Again) — John recalls making a video from Ethiopia six years ago called Looking Away, about listening to and supporting people living in absolute poverty. — 00:02:20
- 2020-01-28 · Looking Away (Again) — John says in those years he did some things and gave some money but made no serious commitment to listen better or to focus on the needs of the poor in an ongoing way. — 00:02:20
- 2020-01-28 · Looking Away (Again) — John says he was looking at a child who very possibly wouldn't be dying had he understood the problem's scope earlier and given more to those solving it, which is part of why he looked away again. (hedged) — 00:02:50
- 2020-01-28 · Looking Away (Again) — John says he understood in the abstract that Sierra Leone's maternal and child mortality crises were emergencies but had not been treating them like emergencies. — 00:02:50
- 2020-01-28 · Looking Away (Again) — John says he wasn't doing nearly enough with the money, power and platform he lucked into, still isn't, but is trying to do more with his money, time and attention. — 00:03:19
- 2020-12-31 · Auld Lang Syne: The Anthropocene Reviewed — John: Auld Lang Syne was popular in World War I, sung in the trenches by British, French, German and Austrian soldiers, and played a small role in the Christmas Truce. — 00:15:10 · also in: We're here because were here., John's Review of Auld Lang Syne
- 2020-12-31 · Auld Lang Syne: The Anthropocene Reviewed — John: On Christmas Eve 1914, in what is now Belgium, around 100,000 British and German soldiers left their trenches and met in No Man's Land. — 00:15:39 · also in: We're here because were here., John's Review of Auld Lang Syne