A somber anniversary was held at Bryan Medical Center’s East Campus Tuesday afternoon. Two years after the COVID-19 pandemic began, ringers from the bell choir at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church rang bells to celebrate the lives that were saved at Bryan and remember the 488 lives lost.
“On March 13th (2020) we opened our command center here at Bryan Medical Center and began learning how to treat, how to prevent and how to care and even how to mourn for people who succumbed to this virus,” says Vice President of Advancement Bob Ravenscroft.
During the ceremony he also praised the tireless work of the Bryan staff. “Everything you endured and everything you did to charge head-first into this the past two years.”
Nina Redl is the chaplain at Bryan Health and led a prayer ceremony to remember all the lives they couldn’t save. “We got to spend a part of their journey with them and they became a part of our journey. We were honored to meet them, even under the most complicated and exhausting circumstances.”
Redl said the shadows of the past two years are still visible. “The memories, good and bad, linger and the careful hesitation of what will come is slowly turning into a celebration that maybe we can breathe.”
At the end of the ceremony Bryan workers were given packages of seeds to take with them. “Sprinkle them in your garden and have it represent that life does go on and a living memory to those that we lost,” Ravenscroft says.