Religious faith is a vital force in life—influencing, among other things, health and wholeness. When a health crisis occurs, the crisis also affects you spiritually. Your faith is your most important resource to assist you in facing the crisis and dealing with the spiritual aspects of your health.
The Department of Spiritual Care offers spiritual support and care to all people during medical crises. If you require specific spiritual services, a chaplain will arrange for these.
Our chaplains are available in the hospital between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday through Friday; ask your nurse if you would like a chaplain to visit you. For emergency needs that arise after-hours, on weekends, or on holidays; you can ask your nurse to page the Interfaith Chaplain on-call at #3437 or the Catholic Chaplain on-call at #3589.
Our chaplains recognize the importance of faith in facing a health crisis, and they offer spiritual support, care, and counsel to assist you with spiritual issues related to your illness and hospitalization.
Working with you and your family, they can help by:
- Finding meaning in your illness
- Drawing on your religious faith to help you cope with your illness and the stresses that can accompany it
- Providing sacraments and religious rites, rituals, and practices that provide spiritual strength in crisis, as well as everyday living
- Counseling for the emotional and spiritual distresses of illness and for the strain they add to relationships
- Consultation for processing the teachings of your religious tradition regarding medical decisions, ethics, and matters of conscience
- Support in dying and while facing death; and for families in their grief immediately following the death of a loved one
- Being a bridge to your religious community or congregation, and to your clergy or spiritual leader
