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The WoRM Program |
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William MacDonald Murray
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Pastoral Care
Pastoral care at Trinity is a unified effort put forth by our priest, the other members of our Lay Pastoral Care Team, and our Lay Eucharistic Visitors. Providing pastoral care to our faith community is a high priority for us at Trinity, and one in which a great deal of time and effort is invested. Pastoral care is how the church demonstrates its love and concern for its members. Those who pastor have as their primary goal assisting the individual or family through a chronic or acute crisis. This crisis might involve living with a long or short term illness, dealing with interpersonal problems, being confined to home or nursing facility, managing financial strain, dealing with bereavement, navigating parental waters, or other issues. Pastoral care, as provided by our Parish Nurse, primarily takes the form of holy listening; that is, being truly present with the individual and family, and acting as a loving sounding board -- in other words, really listening when the other person needs to talk. In addition, pastoral care is provided, for example, when members of the church assist other members in need with things like bringing in meals during a time of illness; providing rides to church or the doctor when transportation is a problem; bringing Holy Communion to those unable to attend the Sunday service; and engaging any of the care provided by the parish nurse. The Parish Nurse is an experienced Registered Nurse, but she does not provide hands-on nursing. Instead, the care provided by the parish nurse is focused on six major functions: integration of faith and health, health education, personal health counseling, health advocacy, health resource/referral agent, leader of support groups and coordinator of lay pastoral volunteers.
In addition, members of our Lay Pastoral Care Team offer much needed assistance to others such as providing occasional transportation for doctor visits; bringing meals in to sick parishioners; occasionally running small errands for parishioners temporarily unable to do so on their own; and participating in our parish Prayer Chain. The parish Prayer Chain is meant to provide immediate intercessory prayer for an individual or family in crisis. As soon as the church is notified that prayers are needed, that need is communicated to the members of the prayer chain so that intercessory prayers can begin. In an effort to guarantee parishioner confidentiality, the reason for the prayer need is not shared with members of the Prayer Chain. The members pray, in general, for the individual or family's physical, mental, emotional and spiritual well-being.
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Lay Eucharistic Visitors help us to remember that those parish members
who are no longer able to come to church are still members of the "Body of
Christ." When an individual becomes housebound, or is a resident in a nursing
facility, they are visited once a month by one of Trinity's Lay Eucharistic
Visitors who conducts a short pastoral visit that culminates in the service of
Holy Communion.
