The Spiritual Care Podcast

This episode considers the need to carve out an experience of silence in our own lives – as a basis for attentively listening to others. But actually setting aside quiet time can be hard can be hard for many of us. It may feel uncomfortable at times and we’re susceptible to distractions, especially amid all the electronic communication coming at us. Our attention can be diverted, even when we have a sincere intention to listen compassionately to another.

There’s a kind of mystery in sitting calmly, patiently, attentively and tuning into someone else’s personal story – their experience and life journey.

In this segment, we hear the insights of people who, in a sense, listen for a living: physicians, counselors, clergy and others. What does it mean to set aside one’s own agenda and truly focus on another person, perhaps someone who is suffering?

Health care chaplaincy has increasingly been a subject of evidence-based research in recent years: What do spiritual care providers do? How do patients and their families respond to a chaplain’s services? Does chaplain care affect levels of anxiety and other forms of distress? To what extent do people facing illness also experience spiritual struggle (e.g. feeling abandoned by God)?

The emerging field of spiritual care research reflects rising interest in best practices for spiritual care providers and in growing attention to the outcomes of chaplains’ services — quality of care, including the level of patient and family satisfaction from hospital stays. Understanding these trends has become especially relevant at a time of ever-greater complexity of health care institutions (and how they are funded).

From firefighters to police officers to the Red Cross and many others, First Responders play an essential role in protecting public safety and helping people cope with emergencies. In this segment, we consider the work of providers of disaster spiritual care. These folks look after both survivors of tragedies and the responders, who are sometimes reeling in the wake of calamity.

We hear the reflections of Rabbi Shira Stern, a long-time Red Cross volunteer (and pastoral counselor) who provides chaplaincy services in times of crisis. She’s been deployed to Ground Zero following the 9/11 attacks in New York, a flood that inundated a West Virginia community, the Boston Marathon bombing and other disasters. Her task is to listen, to offer reassurance and, importantly, to show the survivors – often frightened because their lives have been upended – that they are not alone. Rabbi Stern along with her husband leads a synagogue in Marlboro, NJ (outside New York City). She is the daughter of the late-great violinist Issac Stern, who died of unrelated causes shortly after 9/11, a time when her own mourning coincided with the nation’s.

Next we visit with Rev. James Tilbe, the pastor of the First Congregational Church, located next to the Raynham, Massachusetts Fire Department, where he serves as the fire chaplain and is also an on-call firefighter. Jim finds himself taking care of firefighters and EMTs, who sometimes witness horrific scenes in the course of performing essential duties. Jim also serves as chief chaplain of the Massachusetts Corps of Firefighters. In addition, we hear from Lt. Jeff Kelleher, a veteran of the Raynham department, who describes how firefighters process the challenges of crises in a small New England town.

Perhaps more than any other trait in a spiritual caregiver, the recipients of care yearn for the attention of an open-hearted person who can bear witness to their challenges. But what does it mean to bring that presence into an encounter with someone who may be up against adversity?

We explore this powerful realm in a remarkable dialogue with Frank Rogers, author of Practicing Compassion, recorded April 2018 at Harvard Divinity School, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. (He presented the keynote talk there at our conference, “Cultivating Resilience in the Peaks and Valleys of Chaplaincy.”) Frank is professor of spiritual formation and narrative pedagogy at the Claremont School of Theology, near Los Angeles, where he co-directs the Center for Engaged Compassion, which prepares chaplains to serve in prisons and other venues.

Spiritual caregiving can offer deep personal rewards to practitioners, who are drawn to helping people undergoing distress in a wide range of settings. But by its nature, this kind of work can be emotionally and physically draining. So taking care of oneself also becomes an essential requirement of doing this work, as is discussed.

Also included is an excerpt of our Humankind documentary, previously recorded with chaplains he trained, as well as inmates incarcerated at Los Angeles County jails. That’s from our series, The Power of Nonviolence, which can be heard free at: https://www.humanmedia.org/product/nonviolence/

At the typical nursing station of today’s hospitals, it can sometimes seem like high-tech medical machinery supersedes a personal connection formed between the patient and nurse or other health care professional. But for many caregivers, that one-to-one relationship forms the essence of their service. This episode considers how connections can uplift the patient being cared for, as well as nurses, who spend more time with patients than other medical professionals. It also can help to sustain and revitalize nurses, who often are called to their work through a powerful drive serve people.

How does a caring relationship with patients help them feel less alone in the face of a health crisis? To what extent is it appropriate for caregivers to show human emotion at a moment of vulnerability for the patient? How can nurses respond to the spiritual needs of a patient?

We hear from Connie Delaney, Dean of the School of Nursing at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. She’s a leader in the movement to reinforce the role of nursing – in today’s complex health care setting – in genuinely compassionate, patient-centered care. We also listen to the experiences of Wanda Baker, a pediatric nurse and native Canadian who has worked in critical care and palliative care in Canada and the United States.

We explore the duties and challenges of military chaplains from two nations: Britain and Canada. Ian Wheatley, recorded at the Defence Ministry in Westminster, London, serves as Chaplain of the Fleet of the Royal Navy in the United Kingdom. Sailors bring to chaplains concerns regarding family back home, as well as moral questions about warfare. We hear how seamen and women have wrestled with humanitarian problems like the recent Middle Eastern migrant crisis that spilled into Europe, sometimes with tragic results. In such circumstances, understandable questions about truth and God often arise.

Next, we visit with Padre Guy Chapdelaine, a soft-spoken Canadian who currently serves as Chaplain General of the Canadian Armed Forces, directing about 400 chaplains from diverse denominations. He sees his calling primarily as a “ministry of presence”: to be there, to be open, to hear what people have to share. And with increasing diversity in society, connecting with people of different religions is an essential skill needed to promote harmony. If people are grounded in their own beliefs, it becomes easier, he says, to enter into a healthy relationship with others.

The United States incarcerates more people than any other nation in the world. Federal and state prisons and county jails hold around two million prisoners. In this segment, we explore in-depth the experiences of two prison chaplains. We also hear from two prisoners about their faith journeys while behind bars.