Since our inception, staff has included employees and volunteers, and it is great to see representation from both groups today. I am glad you’re here.

As we begin, please join me in a visual meditation. Indulge with me for a few minutes by closing your eyes; close your eyes and imagine that you are alone in a field. It is a warm and sunny day. The wind is blowing in your face, and as you look out in the field you see sheep grazing on the hillside. You see a bluebird perched on a fence post and in the distance under a stand of trees is a deer hiding in the shadows. As the wind blows in the tall grass you reach down to touch the grass. When you look in the tall grass you see that it is full of life. Butterflies are fluttering in the reeds. Birds are living and eating in the grass. The grass is full of all manner of insects and a Johnny Jump Up flower is peaking up at you. You are so taken by the beauty of life that you want to capture this moment in your heart and mind forever.

As you hold this moment in your heart you are overwhelmed with a flood of memories of all the moments that led you to this place. All those moments are still alive in you. You feel the love for all your family and friends that led you to this moment in time. In that love you know what you are called to do.

• It is time to check in on mom and make sure she is taking her medication.
• It is time to call a new patient to schedule a visit. It is time to pay the bills.
• It is time to call a caregiver to see how they are coping.
• It is time to check in with your co-worker to see if they need help.
• It is time to schedule a counseling visit with a grieving child and parent.
• It is time to call a new employee or volunteer and invite them to orientation.

That is what this sacred space is about, about loving life, about love for one another and the passage of time. (You may open your eyes now.) In a moment we will dedicate this sacred space to those who came before us, to ourselves in this time, and to the future generations to follow us.

There are four themes for our ceremony today:

• First, we are dedicating the buildings and grounds
• Second, we want to thank you our employees and volunteers for all you have done to get us to this place today.
• Third, we recommit to our Hospice of Wake County mission and values
• And lastly we weave this event into the fabric of our history.

I would like to quickly recount our organizational history leading up to today. In a story featured in Metro Magazine for our 25th anniversary, Dr. Dunlap told the story of our dream that began in 1979/1980. “This has been our dream from the very first,” explained Dr. Dunlap. “We went to other hospices around the country that first year, and we were just amazed by what we saw.” Funding challenges over the years pushed back that dream. “In 1980, the board voted to take 20% of everything we raised and set it aside for a building,” he recalled. “Within a year, we had to take that money out and use it in the general fund.” [MetroMagazine, 8.04]

In 1995 we sought to do a capital campaign to build a hospice facility. We engaged a fundraising consultant to do a feasibility study. They told us we were not ready – that we were not big enough, that we were not well known enough and that the community leaders and major donors did not know about Hospice. Well, the Foundation and Hospice of Wake County rolled up their sleeves and worked to make us ready.

In 2000, shortly before she retired, our Executive Director, Karolyn Kaye, led us in a visioning exercise to vision what we wanted for HOWC in the year 2010. I would like to share some of those responses with you.

• A free-standing HOWC inpatient unit, controlled by HOWC
• A hospice home for patients unable to live at their own home
• Move administrative offices adjacent to hospice home
• Our own building [with] enough room to increase our grief support groups and our children’s programs

In 2001 we again did a feasibility study to evaluate if we were ready to embark on a building campaign, and it was determined that YES we were ready.

Dr. Ned Yellig identified more than 100 of his patients who, from 2001-02, would have been eligible for the hospice home, had we had such a facility at the time.

David White, Foundation Trustee and volunteer Ambassador, called 26 hospices around the country in 2001 to see if they had hospice homes and, if so, how they were faring.

In 2003, we did a long-range strategic plan that included new office space and a free-standing hospice facility. The creation of this particular campus began in 2004 with the filing of a special need petition to the state for the privilege of applying for a Certificate of Need for a free-standing hospice facility. Five years and three CONs later this project in its current phase will conclude when we are certified to bill Medicare and Medicaid for hospice inpatient stays in our new hospice home.

We know our first 20 beds will soon be full. This week we have submitted a new CON application to expand our hospice home to 30 beds. We are years away from our next expansion but we want to start the process now.

Before we begin the Call to Service I would like to thank a few folks. Thank you to the members of the Staff Dedication Sub-Committee:

• Anne Arndt
• Christy Beavers
• Mike Blanchard
• Sloane Browning
• Darcy Dye
• Cooper Linton
• Alison Stephens

A huge thanks to the Woman’s Club of Raleigh for helping with this event (and several events throughout the year) and for providing the refreshments. And thank you to Russell Gainer and the Spiritual Care team for planning and performing our ceremony this morning.

[Horn/conch blows- three blasts]

As surely as the wind that blows through the canyon is shaped by the course it is given, so also the canyon is shaped by the wind.

What we do and say in a place helps shape it. And in shaping a space we in turn shape ourselves.

Much has been said and done about this place prior to today. Much has been said and done as a response to the energy and resources which flow though us -- so that this dream could be realized. May we have a sense of thanksgiving, for the years of effort, hundreds of people, thousands of hours, millions of dollars and the immeasurable thought and intention that have gone into shaping these buildings and grounds, our program, and the way we welcome patients, family, staff, and volunteers into this place.

Welcome to the Hospice of Wake County Hospice and Palliative Care Center, which includes the 27,000 square foot Susan P. Rouse Administrative and Community Services Building housing the Kit Boney Horizons Grief Center, the 19,000 square foot William M. Dunlap Center for Caring housing 14 acute and 6 residential patient care rooms, the 1,000 sf Dorothy Kerr Sanctuary serving the spiritual needs of all faiths, the Peter and Marie Hayes Colonnade connecting the buildings on the campus, the SECU Gardens and various other gardens.

This campus is the culmination of the exemplary and compassionate work of clinical and office staff, the foresight of the foundation and board of directors, and hundreds of talented and committed volunteers. As one of our chaplains pointed out, some give by going while others go by giving, but all contribute to the Mission ("empowering individuals, families, and communities to embrace meaning at the end of life"), Vision ("to be the leader in creating access and providing comprehensive end of life care"), and Values ("Compassion, Respect, Teamwork, and Commitment") of Hospice of Wake County.

The synergy of our combined efforts and resources creates an opportunity for serving a purpose greater than ourselves. Those who labor in the field and thousands of grateful families created the outstanding reputation of Hospice of Wake County, which led to this wonderful new home in the fields. So today we don’t just dedicate brick and mortar, we rededicate ourselves to the calling of serving others. Thank you – all of you – for making this possible.

Whether you will come here to work every day, or only visit the campus occasionally, know that you are all welcome here. Please look past the current shortage of parking, the mud and the strangeness of this new campus. Familiarize yourself with the buildings and grounds and resolve to use this beautiful place to work, browse the libraries, meet with colleagues, enjoy a quiet lunch, find peace, and renew your spirit. We hope you begin to make a connection today to our lovely new home that will nurture your soul and support your work. Discover the staff lounges and lunch rooms, find your mailbox, learn where to find the bathrooms, return to explore the many beautiful gardens planned, and make a date to savor a picnic and find solace in the pastoral setting and the goats.

In our coming together today let us be mindful in our words and actions that we may begin the process of shaping this space into a place of welcome and healing; a place of solace and peace. In our creating and recreating let us attend to the ways in which we are shaped. This building, these grounds exist in time and place and beyond. This place reaches to the farthest corners of Raleigh the nation and the world. It reaches even beyond into the eternal. Let us expand in our awareness of this reality here today.

Blessing is to name what already is true and by so naming it, it becomes even more so. So we ask: What already is, and is yet trying to emerge here today and into the future? We ask: What has been trying to emerge into this place as if we didn’t already know in our fiber? Although today marks a new beginning for Hospice of Wake County, these gardens and rooms will envelope the final journey of patients and the fellowship they have with their loved ones.

As you walk around the buildings and grounds, ask yourselves how you will help to make this final journey as rich, comfortable, meaningful, and beautiful as possible. The physical center of this campus is also a spiritual one. At the very center of this campus is the sanctuary which anchors us as community in common purpose to be compassion, to live as family and to work with integrity. This place is organically connected to the work we do in homes and facilities throughout our area. Bless this place and all of us, who commit our work to the service of others.

In some cultures, colorful flags are hung to symbolize and carry the dreams and desires of the people. We’ve all been offered the opportunity to create in word or picture a “Flag of Hope” that represents our hopes, wishes, blessings, prayers, desires, sentiments, visions for this new facility and all the lives—of patients, families, and staff--that will intersect and find blessing here.

As a part of the hallowing of this new space and in recognition of our interconnected lives and dreams, we now invite all who are present to carry the “Flags of Hope” banners that we have collectively created in a procession throughout the buildings and grounds.

As you walk through each space or area, you will carry with you all the wishes and prayers that have been expressed on these flags, sharing those desires and visions of compassion all along the way you travel.

Each group will journey throughout the building and grounds with a portion of the banner of flags. As you come into each space in this new place, we invite you to enter reflectively and in celebration, bringing all these hopes and dreams with you.

And now may your words, images and prayers be part of the living, breathing foundation of this work, within and beyond these walls.

We invite you, following our closing word, to continue reflecting on this experience, sharing your hopes for this place, and your place in it, over hors-d’ouevres in the lobby.

Please reach out and hold the hand of the person beside you. Be aware of the life energy that flows between us. May all that has been and all that is to be, be both blessed and blessing in this home of healing and hospitality. Let it be so.