This Monday, I drove from one end of the universe to the other.

Not literally, of course. I was only driving a few short miles from the cemetery, where I had just completed a funeral, and heading straight back to the maternity ward of the hospital, where Chana and our brand-new baby son were waiting for me.

But emotionally and spiritually, it felt like I was traveling from one world to another.

From a place of tears to a place of joy. From a place of loss to a place of birth.

From a place that overwhelms you with death to a place so full of new life.

As I was driving, I could not stop thinking about the contrast. The cemetery is so respectful and still. The maternity ward is so full of hustle and noise. A cemetery makes you think about the end. A maternity ward is all about new beginnings.

But then I thought about it a little more.

Is a cemetery really only a place of death?

I was just there, and I’m alive. The family was alive. The friends who came to honor and remember were alive, standing there with love, memories, and loyalty.

And is a hospital really only a place of life?

Sadly, I have been in hospitals many times for very different reasons. I have stood at many bedsides where life was slipping away. I have been there with families at those most painful moments of loss and death.

So what defines a place? Is it just who is there? Is it what most people are doing there?

And somewhere on that drive between the cemetery and the hospital, I realized that the difference between these two places is not only what happens there, but WHY people go there.

A hospital is a place of life because that is its purpose. People go there to fight for life, to be healed, and to bring new life into the world. Even when there is pain, and even when there is death, the mission of the hospital remains a place for preserving life.

A cemetery is different. Even though living people are there, even though holy and beautiful things happen there, its........

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