Praying For Healing

A conversation between Father Luigi Gioia, Theologian in Residence at Saint Thomas Church, New York, and The Revd. Dr. Gillian Straine CEO of GoHealth.

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TOPICS:

Why pray for healing?

The difference between being cured and being healed.

What is happening for people at Lourdes.

The healing sacraments.

The place of death in prayers for healing.

The difference between acceptance and resignation.

The importance of community in healing experiences.

Father Luigi’s own very personal current experience of praying for healing.

TRANSCRIPT

Gillian Straine: Welcome to the Go Health podcast. I’m Gillian Strain, chief exec of GoHealth, an organisation with a vision to enable churches and individual Christians to be a healing presence in the world. And we like to think of the GoHealth podcast as a place of belonging for healing presences. People who want to connect health and faith and make a difference in the world, particularly where there’s suffering.

And in this episode, we’re kicking off a new occasional series exploring some of the big questions of the healing ministry. And we’ve got a big question today, and we’ve got a great guest to help us do this. Father Luigi Gioia has been a novice master in France and the Abbot of a Benedictine community in Italy. He moved to the Anglican church a few years ago, working as a priest in St. Paul’s church in Knightsbridge, where I met him, where we worked together for a bit, and now he’s on the team as theologian in residence at Saint Thomas’s Church in New York City. Luigi has a long academic history, being associated with universities in Oxford, Cambridge and in Rome, and he writes in lots of different areas, including monastic spirituality and contemplative prayer. Luigi, thank you so much for being here and for sitting down with me on the GoHealth podcast.

Luigi Gioia: It’s a pleasure to be here, Gillian, and thank you very much for your invitation. I mean, having been having worked together with you at St. Paul’s Knightsbridge, and we can get to know you, it’s always a pleasure. I really do. And especially because I really, value the work you do, and, and find that it is particularly important, and especially in the pastoral context. I’m very glad for our cooperation. Yes. 

Gillian: Aww…thank you. And you know what? I was, praying. We’re talking about prayer so a full disclosure, like, who could I chat to? Cause this is such a big topic I want to tackle today. Why is it that we pray for healing? This is what we do at Go Health. But you know what? It’s a really good question. Why do we pray for healing? And and you came into my mind as a great person to articulate some of this for us and to share some of your stories and your experience. So, Luigi, why why do we pray for healing as Christians?

Luigi: I find this question not an easy one. And when you asked me to speak on this podcast, I, part of me had an inner reluctance, probably it is because I spent most of my life as a monk, as you might know. I joined the monastery when I was 17, and I was in the monastery for over 20 years. And a great deal of monastic formation is living with a deep acceptance of God’s presence and will in our life, that includes also, illness, death. Saint Benedict even says that, life is a preparation for death. Monastic life is a preparation for death. And it is meant to be said in a positive way. So there is a sense in which prayier for healing, it’s not always been something that I, I have practiced because I was not in a pastoral context until very late in my life, and also something that I struggled with to the extent that – is it something we are truly, supposed to do?

I know this might seem, crazy, but it is true. I mean, is this something we are supposed to do? Should we not just accept what happens in our lives when God sends to us? And it is only when, I find myself, in more directly in pastoral contexts, and confronted with the requests for healing from people, that I discovered that not only it is absolutely essential to, engage, to answer positively to a question of this kind, but also that there is something about engaging in this that creates a connection with the person you are praying with.

I don’t think myself is praying for, but praying with. And it is also accepting to be brought out of your comfort zone. Often when we are asked to pray for healing, for the healing of someone, we are not ourselves in need of that particular healing. And when you are in that position, you don’t want to think about illness. You don’t want to think. You don’t want to be dragged, you know, into a territory that is always uncomfortable, a) because it raises the prospect for us also the possibility for us also to, to feel, but also because it’s so incredibly difficult to say anything, and to make sure that you say the right thing. So why do we pray for healing?

For me, it has become clear that fundamentally is a request for being with someone else in my ordeal. Having someone who helps me to be more connected with God or reestablish a connection, which I’ve struggled to maintain because this situation has made me unable to pray, or unwilling to pray. So it is not just the only aspect, of course, of the prayer of healing, but the one that has always resonated with me and helped me to overcome all these sorts of irrational or, reluctance with the prayer of healing is always been to see the value, to see the beauty actually more than the value, the beauty of what happens when you pray for healing with someone.

Gillian: When you’re talking there I noticed you use the word connection. Is that at the heart of the healing ministry? 

Luigi: I think it is. I had, you know, I can give a, I mean, an example, which probably is not it’s so common that, it’s almost blasphemous it seems to me that to compare it with the suffering of people. But I had the worst toothache I’ve ever had in my life last year. I couldn’t sleep. There was no remission to the pain. No painkiller worked. And it was probably the the greatest pain I’ve ever felt in my life. But what I remember of that period is that I was alone with my pain. I was so lonely. So my husband was there trying to bring me comfort in any possible way. And I rejected him because, you know, it’s, on one hand, I wanted him to be close to me. On the other hand, I wanted him to be away because I didn’t want to be touched. So this is one of the aspects – there are many others that mean that whenever we we are in great pain, we are alone with that pain. It’s something that that really kind of isolates us. And then there is the other aspect is that illness is something that separates us out from other people. Our culture is so dominated by, we are all busy. we all want to project the image of health and assurance and independence, etc. that as soon as I am ill, not only I am confined to my room, not only I am isolated because of the pain, but also I feel an outsider.

Gillian: Yeah.

Luigi: I feel an outsider. And this, this is probably one of the aspects, related to illness, that I think the prayer of healing addresses, at least immediately, indirectly, is that, you know, I am with you, even if it is incommensurate with your pain and with your illness. I am with you in this. 

Gillian: What about the God element in all of this? How does that, augment the connecting we’re talking about when we’re talking about prayer for healing? 

Luigi: Very often when people are confronted with the experience of illness and serious illness, it can become very difficult to, if not to believe in God, to believe that God really cares about me, to believe that God is with me in this. If sometimes, not even worse, so I start being angry at God or whatever is up, outside there that allows this to happen to me. So the healing ministry, or prayer for healing, establishes the connection not only with another person or by establishing the connection with another person , also helps to bring God into the picture in a different way. If this God has allowed someone to come towards me to be with me in this, it might be possible that he wants to be with me in this. It’s a very tenuous beginning, I think, but it is a real kind of point of connection with God, a way of establishing or reestablishing or deepening communication with God.

But I deeply believe that, connection with God is inseparable with connection to, other persons, to a community. It is very very difficult, to keep that relationship or to activate that relationship, when this is not supported by by your community. 

Gillian: Yeah. So let’s talk about the community aspect of it as well. You know, so often people go to church because something’s gone wrong, you know. Oh, I came to church because my my partner died, and and then I started coming I found my community. There’s sort of this memory somewhere, subconscious perhaps, that the church, the Christian faith, does something good around death and suffering. So we’ve got that aspect of it. But on the other side, my first job most mornings, Luigi, is to go on to Facebook usually and remove all the the occasional trolls I get, you know – what what what are you going on about? You know, if if this all worked we wouldn’t have hospitals, right? I get this a lot. So it seems like there is this huge opportunity for the church to grow. We have some kind of theology or spiritual practices that can help people connect in. Yet at the same time, it’s quite a difficult thing to market, isn’t it? Because we’re talking about something quite subtle. We’re not talking about, oh, guaranteed miracles or, you know, everything’s gonna get better. How do we handle this spectrum of diversity of thinking around the potential for the healing ministry? 

Luigi: One of the main problems, I think, today, that we face with evangelisation is that, we are forced to deal with the wrong framing of the question. So usually, people come with questions of why suffering? Why should I believe in a god that is supposed to be all powerful and benevolent and allows suffering in the world? And it is as if the answer to this question would have to be an argument, so compelling that people, because of that argument, would be led to believe in God. Now, we know that even if we had the perfect answer to this question, the perfect argument, this would not lead people to believe in God. It is not the reason why they do, at least is not the reason why I did. I was very…I remember when I was an adolescent, I was incredibly tormented by the issue of suffering and death. And then, someone was close, close to me. I mean, it was not a close friend, but someone I saw every day, committed suicide. And that thing really struck me. He was, in a coma for a week and it was during that week that on one hand, I was shocked by this, and I felt the need for more meaning or for for something that helped me to navigate that, that situation. And on the other hand, I felt someone the need for someone to pray to. So I started to pray, even if I consider myself not a believer at that time. And I did not find the answer to why this happened. But I knew that somehow that experience drew me towards establishing a conversation with God. And, instead of asking questions in the void, I started to ask these questions to him and the foundation I think for Christian faith is not that Christianity gives us the answer to all the questions and especially to the question of suffering and death, but gives us gives a presence in it, gives a, a connection, again, gives us a community in which we can together live with this question and, and with this reality, in our lives. 

Gillian: I want to go back to something you said right at the beginning of, of this conversation when you talk about being a monk and the whole thing is a preparation for death in a positive way. Is the healing. Is that what the healing ministry is about? Just falling deeper and deeper into some kind of reassurance that we’re connected to God? Doesn’t matter what we face? Rather than a quick fix? I don’t know… 

Luigi: I mean, when it comes to the experience of being a monk, I remember I was 18 and it was immediately, thrown into the deep end because I was, I was asked to look after, a, an old monk who was, completely paralysed. So I, I fed him, I changed him, I spent a lot of time with him, and that experience was so incredible because it was someone was completely unable to talk, could communicate only with his eyes. And yet, through this, having me having to take care of him – a connection, I mean, it was like incredible, we understood each other just looking each other through the eyes and, making him smile was probably one of the best, the greatest reward I can have, I could have when I was doing this. So this is the kind of experience I had. Also, the other thing is when you are in a monastery you live with different generations. There are elder monks, and there is at least I must have seen 1 or 2 people die almost every year since the age of 18. And the people, you know, they are found dead in their room, or they are, ill. We, we look after them and we are with them the moment they die. So death is something  you, you live with. And I wouldn’t say that it normalises it, but it becomes an aspect of life. It becomes, becomes something you, you live with. And it doesn’t make you not fear death, because, I mean, death is is something, or, illness and suffering. But at the same time, you are not as unprepared to deal with it when it comes into your life as you would be if you lived in a culture where this was as, a kind of, excluded from the public perception as possible, in favour of a model in which, you know, all we should we’re supposed to be all young or beautiful and healthy all the time.

Gillian: I was very curious about the role of prayer and all this. And whether you distinguish between praying for a cure and praying for healing. Is is…are we supposed to pray just for perseverance when we’re going through these things? Or should we be praying for a cure? Or should we be saying, well, it’s up to God what happens anyway?

What should we be praying for when facing this serious illness? 

Luigi: I mean, one thing which is sure is that God wants us to pray for the illness to go, to go away. So whatever is is…making us suffer. Whatever. Whatever gives, causes us pain. Whatever separates us from the community, from life, God wants us to pray for that. So it is not only us absolutely legitimate, but also, you know, almost I think, a requirement, or an aspect of fundamental aspects of, of a mature and deep faith that, ‘I’m not afraid to pray, to pray for any, anything and not just because I want to, but because I’m authorised by God to do this, you know, ‘Ask and it will be given to you. Knock it will be opened, to you.’ 

Gillian: So so we put we do that, we we pray for the cure, but the cure doesn’t come. What next? 

Luigi: The cure doesn’t come. Now, that’s the thing. So, when it comes to, to the way a prayer works, that that becomes a difficult thing to say. So, it is very easy to say whether a therapy, medical therapy works because it either produces results. The results that were expected and intended from the beginning or it doesn’t – when it comes to, to healing, and I say this to myself all the time, I have no idea what impact my prayer of healing, our prayer of healing is going to have on the person that asks for it. I have no idea whether this impact is going to be felt now or, in, in a future. I only believe that God will not leave any prayer unanswered. The way he answers this prayer, then, is something that I live to have the patience to, to wait and see. Any you know, I know this is a very unsatisfactory answer for someone who prays for health. Or at least as a motivation – Why should I pray for health if in the end, it’s not a…there’s no guarantee that God is going to, to give me what I ask, ask him, for. But there is a sense in which, for me, the healing starts the moment I start praying. Prayer always empowers you because prayer is a way of, of hoping for what nothing else allows me to hope for. It’s me daring to, want something that if I listened only to science or listen to only to, to the way the world, you know, mechanistic approach to the world would not allow me to, to do. So in that sense, it is an act of, almost, I would say rebellion against anything that says to me – oh you can’t or you shouldn’t. No, I, I do it because, first of all, I’m not only authorised, but, asked to do it by God. So God says to me, do it. By doing this already, I’m, I’m reacting against something. And again, you know, there is the connection element we mentioned earlier. I’m not alone anymore in in this. 

Gillian: I love the example you’re giving about, you know, the rebellious nature of praying for healing against the system. So, I had cancer when I was 21, when I talk about my experience I’ll say I was cured by science. But I it was just a beginning of a healing journey that I went on, right. So I was cured by a lot of chemotherapy, a little bit of radiotherapy and a lot of psychotherapy to get over this. And actually the physical journey, the psychological journey, the spiritual journey, for me, it was bringing together the promise of the gospel or, and the image, I think Psalm – it’s gone out my head, 139, you are made in your mother’s womb. A beautiful image of how we’re known, not just when my mum was pregnant, but just from eternity. How on earth can that be true? How on earth can I reconcile that with cancer? Advanced cancer at 21, there’s a medical journey there, a psychological journey, but the spiritual journey as well. So often I’ll talk about healing, you know, it’s a spiritual journey working out who I am now in the light of this experience. And it’s what our faith helps us with.

But you know what, I just had, last year we had the Healing Festival for the organisation I run. And we had a healing service. We had mass, we had laying on of hands. I had all my trustees. I had lots of guests. I had to organise the sandwiches because my friend wasn’t able to help with the sandwiches. I came home at the end and my husband said, oh, how did it go? This is oh, it went great. Everyone got a good sandwich. Speakers turned up. Trustees were happy. It was a great day. 

And the next day I woke up and looked at my phone and two people had written to me to say they’d been healed at the healing service, and I’d forgotten – that wasn’t on my register of things to look at to see whether, the day had been a success. And, so, so often in the healing ministry, I think, we’re about all the other stuff and the, the journeys and the coming alongside and so on. But sometimes God breaks in with a miracle, doesn’t it? So I just how do we pray, knowing that sometimes we get these miraculous cures that we can’t explain and forget to expect, but so often it doesn’t come to us. And we’ve got to look for the longer, the longer journey.

Luigi: I had an experience of this, because I lived for years near Lourdes in, in France. So. And I used to go to Lourdes all the time. Now, I’ve always been very, not very comfortable at, say, with that aspect of the Marial devotion, especially hyper Marial devotion catholicism, etc…People can say, oh, this place is highly commercialised, whatever, you know. But one thing which is true is that, thousands and thousands, tens of thousands of people with illness go there every year. And for me, just being in that place and seeing what was happening and talking to people has always been an immensely, rewarding experience from from a spiritual viewpoint. Now, as you know, a lot of miracles have happened at Lourdes, miracles even that have been recognised by the church and church goes through a very, does this very the Catholic Church does this very, very rarely. And when it does make sure that it has gone through a really stringent process of, scientific evaluation. So it has to be totally unexplainable from a scientific viewpoint. So there’ve been cases of miracle, but they’re very, very sporadic. And yet people keep flocking there and repeat the experience often and feel that it is worth doing precisely because it is a healing experience in the sense that, it’s a place where the person with illnesses at the center of everything that happens, everything is organised around the persons who are, suffering and ill. It is a place where you receive immense comfort from the context of singing, of bathing in, in the, in the water, of touching the rock. So all aspects that involve the body that allow you to do, things, praying not just with your mind, but also, kind of engage physically into, into, into something.  And this really gives so much comfort, so much strength again, so much, positive energy if you want to use that vocabulary to, to people. It’s not curing, it’s not the miracle they’ve expected. But there’s many ways in which it is a kind of miracle. It’s a miracle that has brought hope in, in the life of the people who, have, engaged in it. And it’s something that, you know, I don’t think that anyone – it might be discarded, you know, by those who reason on these issues purely, you know, from from a, from a remote place, you know. If you ask someone, if you explain what I just said to you, to someone who is not a believer, who is an observer of Christianity, of this phenomena, I would say, oh, well, you know, cheap consolation, etc. But if you talk to the people who have gone through suffering, have gone through illness, have done this experience, they will all tell you this has strengthened my faith in God.

This has renewed my hope. So it is. It can be evaluated properly, I think, only by the people who engage in this process. And not only those people, but the volunteers. 

Gillian: Yeah.

Luigi: that’s the other thing.

Gillian: I did read a paper about Lourdes, there was a group went to study the sign the scientific impact, psychological impact and, of of cures. And they thought they were going to do studies of miraculous cures and what’s going on around it, but they actually ended up writing papers on the volunteers and the people whose lives had been changed by volunteering, by caring for the ill. You know, people were able to find healing and release from bad experiences in their own lives.

So they went there expecting to measure miracles and ended up listening to the stories of those who were coming alongside. 

Luigi: Yes. 

Gillian: And in England, we’ve got Walsingham, the Anglican shrine there that has a very embodied healing ministry as well. You go and you drink the waters and they throw the water around. It’s a very, sensory experience in the church itself. And many people flock there as well. And it’s a place that doesn’t accept the ministry of women, the priestly ministry of women. So it’s always a difficult place for me. I go. I always have spiritual experiences there. I’ve had a mystical experience there of hearing God, that’s not something that happens to me very often in this place that, my ministry is not even accepted. So it’s, there’s a lot of ambiguity around these places for the use of the body. The full body experience, I think is really interesting. 

And and, Luigi, you shifted from the Catholic tradition to the Anglican tradition, I wonder if there’s any particular insights about healing and prayer, that you bring to your Anglican ministry now or Episcopal ministry now, from the, from your Catholic roots? 

Luigi: Well, one, one is exactly the one, we’ve just talked about. So the, the place that the, Catholic priest lives for things that other traditions might consider superstition. And it is true that, you know, there is a potential danger in these practices. But what is good about those is that they, they are not in the expression of magical thinking. People engage on those don’t look for quick fixes, but look for other ways of, of engaging in a healing process, which is not just because we use we, we are too cerebral very often, or we are too word oriented, when often something which is physical, like walking, like touching, like water, etc. might have even a bigger impact on you. So this is one of the aspects which I value of the tradition of the Roman Catholic tradition. Otherwise, I mean aspects of the Catholic tradition that are present, in the especially in the Anglo-Catholic tradition in the, in the Anglican Church, is the anointing of the sick and the, the fact of bringing communion to the sick, the bringing communities, the sick I think I love because of its name is ‘bringing communion’. We are not just bringing the host for the people to communicate with Jesus Christ. That is, someone who is a sign that, you know, even if you can’t be physically present, you still belong, we still care for you. So done properly, this ministry should be the expression of how much we want to keep you, how much you belong to to the community.

So this touches to the, isolation aspects of illness we consider, we talked about earlier. The anointing of the sick, it is there probably that I, I had more than once this curious experienced. When I administered it to people who are about to die. So this is up in probably, three months ago, I was some one evening, was asked urgently to, to bring, to go to, to to visit someone who had never met in person before, who was dying in a hospital here in New York. So I rushed to the hospital. There were two people there. The person was in a deep coma. So the only thing I could do is to say a few prayers, then, you know, give the anointing which becomes the last rites in these occasions. And then, lo and behold, the person wakes up!

Gillian: Oh, okay. 

Luigi: Unexpectedly. And and this is something that has happened, you know, it. Oh, everyone, to all the priests I’ve known who have done this, will tell you that typically, especially with the last rites, when you administer them to people, there’s a, a kind of, almost a, regain of energy and health sudden…quite sudden. So the person woke up and started to talk and she even she even made a few jokes, and, and we talked a bit about faith and, and I said, can we pray together? I prayed for you now, but I’m so glad we can pray together. So we prayed together, and, and then I left. And she died the following day.

Gillian: Waow

Luigi: But then that, that really, to me is again, you know, these, these the potency of these signs. I don’t know if it is, you know, the sign itself, if it is the sacrament or if it is the presence of people who really care for you and want to establish, one want to have a moment in which you know, God is here, you are there, we are there. And, it’s not just about curing you or doing something for your body, but it’s just activated in particular circumstances that we, we are not aware of in normal times, but in these occasions that can that can produce what to me, it’s a small miracle. 

Gillian: Well, it’s so beautiful isn’t it. I remember giving last rites to a chap I’d been, visiting for many months when I was a curate. And, he’d been – had an extraordinary war. He’d been there D-Day landings. He’d, he he was a medic. He did. I got to know him really well. And I went to give last rites to…My son was just six months or so. I handed this baby over in the hospice to some of the nurses and gave last rites. And then I went off. I was on maternity leave. I just come to give him last rites. I went off for a walk with my mum, I remember, and then about an hour and a half later I said to my mum, I think he’s just died. I just knew he’d died and I was right to within five minutes. I just felt him go, just because it was that connection that you’d had. And I think so often I hear the story, not people waking up, but of dying very quickly after having received last rites. There’s some kind of peace release expected there. 

Luigi: Yes. 

Gillian: I know this is something you’re facing a bit more personally at the moment, because your mum’s really ill, isn’t she? 

Luigi: Yes, yes. 

Gillian: What is he…? And she’s far away from you right now. She’s in a different country. What does healing prayer mean for you in this situation, as you’re facing this, you know, a significant loss of of a parent? 

Luigi: Yes. I mean, the thing, is, is that, you know, I mentioned how I, I’ve been familiar with illness and death, since I was a young monk. And so it’s and, you know, in my ministry, obviously, like you, I’ve, been exposed to that so many times, but, however much you might have been exposed to this through your ministry, in your life, there is nothing that prepares you to having to deal with the prospect of death of the mother. Of the person whose so close to you. It’s a completely different thing. I was really taken aback by how differently it is impacted, impacted me. So this has been this has been the first, big, surprise. And in this, I have to say that, just the support and the, the warmth of the community has been incredible. I mean, the my fellow clergy here…in the first days, I was really, very upset, which is something which I, you know, when you think oh I’m a priest, I, I should be able to handle this much better than I do. Well, no, I mean, it was I was really I was kind of breaking into tears, you know, in meetings, etc..And everyone has been, has been fantastic, has been like, you know, just the right amount and the right kind of presence that is really has helped me to, to go through that moment. And prayer for me has become, really a way of, of dealing with all this onslaught of feelings. You know, there is fear, there is anxiety. There is guilt. I mean, guilt, a huge amount of guilt, for what I miss in relationship with my mother for for whether I should have done something to prevent this from happening, etc., etc.. And there prayer is, is for me really this, this constant letting myself to be, to offload all this on, on the Lord and and being in his presence is, is is really the most comforting thing. But then there is another aspect which is, which is the one I’m, to be honest, still battling with at the moment. Battling probably is not the right metaphor again, but, you know, like dealing with again. And it is the, the, the, the difference between resignation and acceptance. So I think that acceptance is a, is a fundamental, valuable and positive attitude, in these circumstances. But, acceptance, does not mean that, you know, I let go and I don’t pray for, for whatever, I can hope for. But as resignation is, is more this, almost, letting the situation dictate everything. Being, becoming passive, becoming almost yeah, passive in presence in this situation. Whereas now, I think prayer helps me to feel that I keep some agency. I can bring a certain quality of presence as a quality of, of, comfort. This is this is one of the things I never quite realised how, in this situation, it’s important to cultivate acceptance, but, but, and not, let yourself go into into resignation. This is this is, you know, this is what I am at the moment.

Gillian: And your prayer for her right now?

Luigi: My my first prayer is that, you know, she keeps the faith alive and that she finds in this faith comfort and strength and then, obviously, that she doesn’t suffer. 

Gillian: Yeah. Well, thank, thank God for medical care and for all the drugs we have for that. And Luigi, we will pray for her as well. And for you, as, on this journey ahead. 

Luigi: Thank you.

Gillian: Luigi, thank you so much for joining us on the GoHealth podcast, for sharing your insights and your wisdom and your experiences, as well. It’s been a joy to talk to you about prayer for healing. Thank God you don’t give the easy answer. You know, there’s no simple answers here. And that’s what we are about at GoHealth. Because, you know, it’s it is complex, but we give thanks to God with us, in the journey and the thinking about it and, and that we can connect to God and to our communities as we seek health and healing for ourselves and for those, whom we love.

So we’re going to pick up this conversation over in the GoHealth community, which is a group of people who are committed to exploring how to flourish in the faith today and to be a healing presence in the world. Thank you to Rosie Dawson, our producer, and Wendy Lloyd from the GoHealth team for all her work on this series and the podcast.

If you have enjoyed this conversation, please do share it and let others know about the work of the GoHealth community, where together we seek to flourish and be a healing presence in the world today. Luigi, thank you so much for joining us all the way from New York’s. Very exciting to be transatlantic today. 

Luigi: Thank you, Gillian, and thank you for all of it, it’s been a great pleasure.