Well-Versed Good Samaritan Puts Prayers In Print By Creating Line Of Soothing Gems

Phil Stack breaks the rules. He speaks to strangers. He picks up hitchhikers. He lives for the moment.

Actually, he lives for the mission moment: a split-second opportunity in which he, and only he, can help someone and act as Christ would have.

Such a moment came outside Billings, Mont., on a recent trip east when he picked up a hitchhiker, bought him a steak dinner and helped him find a room for the night.

“I consider that an honor and not an inconvenience, a calling and no mere accident,” said the retired clinical psychologist from Medical Lake.

His latest mission: Soothing Gems, a line of greeting cards that, in verse, offer prayers of support and encouragement to the sick, elderly and alone.

While his wife, Fe’, practices psychiatry at Eastern State Hospital and his children are raising families of their own (three of the six are physicians), Stack writes and designs his cards.

The inspiration for Soothing Gems came last summer after a sudden illness while traveling forced the 66-year-old into a South Dakota hospital.

After three days of staring at a blank wall far from home, he vowed to create something spiritually comforting for people alone and facing their mortality.

The 8-1/2-by-11-inch illustrated cards combine Stack’s words with the images by an artist friend and laser prints of flowers from his own garden.

Stack has read the poetry at senior gatherings and nursing homes and often personalizes the text.

The cards are suitable for framing, because Stack believes all mission moments ought to be remembered.

“I feel the good we do lives on forever in other people’s lives,” he said.

The son of Czechoslovakian immigrants, Stack worked at state hospitals across the country before moving to the Spokane area six years ago.

From helping someone at a grocery store to he and his wife hosting Christmas for two single-parent families, he looks for opportunities to be of service.

A member of St. Rose of Lima Catholic Church in Cheney, he volunteers at Spokane’s West Central Community Center. He’s also developed an ink-blot board game and a line of romantic cards that he still springs on his wife of 38 years.

“It boils down to doing what is important in life,” he said. “Soap operas are unimportant for life. People are extremely important.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo; 2 illustrations of greeting cards

MEMO: Soothing Gems are available at The Kaufer Co., 907 W. Boone, in Spokane, or by writing Dr. Phil Stack, Box 399, Medical Lake, WA 99022.