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Document No 18
June 2004 Page last updated:
6 August, 2005
St Helens and Knowsley Hospitals NHS Trust
Chaplaincy Department
Telephone 0151 430 1657
I understand you are interested to hear about World Faith initiatives in Health Care Chaplaincy. I write as Head of Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care Services at the St Helens and Knowsley Hospitals NHS Trust. Among our patients only 1% are from ethnic minorities and almost all of our patients profess to be Church of England, Free Church or Roman Catholic. However, the distribution among our staff is very different and we do have a significant number (currently I am told around 25) of Muslim staff who have identified themselves as a group needing space for prayer. With our present plant we have been having difficulty lately in making adequate provision, but a large enough room has now been set aside and in our new PFI Build we are planning much better facilities. I myself and, now that we have reached the design stage, a representative from my Muslim colleagues will be taking part in Consultation meetings shortly.
I have been in post since March 2002 and in December of that year we held our first Eid celebration, financed in part by the Trust. This arose out of a discussion between me and the Chairman of the Board concerning our forthcoming Christmas celebrations and it was felt that it would be appropriate to facilitate some kind of celebration of Eid shortly before Christmas. After discussion with our Muslim colleagues we had an enjoyable evening in our Post Graduate Centre. The majority of folk who attended were Muslim colleagues and their families, but a few Christian staff members attended along with two members of our chaplaincy team. After a talk given by a representative from ‘Doctors Worldwide' (a charity dedicated to medical relief worldwide) we shared in a Hallal meal. The evening was deemed to have been successful, but we decided (we being all present) that the following year we would try to encourage more of a dialogue between members of different faiths by encouraging our non – Muslim friends and colleagues to attend as well as the Muslims.
I drew together a small group of those interested last Autumn and the end result was an Eid celebration in December 2003 entitled “Fasting and Feasting”. Again the event was part funded by the Trust and part by sponsorship and on this occasion the Mayor of Knowsley was invited; I was his Chaplain at the time! About 70 folk attended; Muslim members of staff and their families and invited guests from among their colleagues of faiths other than Muslim, or of no faith. There were a number of children present too which enhanced our gathering and photographs were taken for our intranet site and Trust Newsletter. I enclose two of the photos but of course would need to seek consent if they were to be published more widely. Short talks were given by a representative of the Muslim faith and a representative of the Christian faith on the two perspectives on fasting and feasting. This led to stimulating discussion as we once again shared a Hallal meal (ordered and served by our Trust Catering department). I enclose a sample ticket/invitation. Each Muslim member of staff was given a number of tickets and asked to invite a non-Muslim colleague as well as their family.
Again the evening was a success and I believe that this event will now be an annual tradition! It is supported by our Chairman and Chief Executive and has done much to strengthen working relationships and our mutual understanding.
For those occasions when we have patients who need a religious leader of a faith other than Christian we do have readily available Faith Contact Lists giving details of who may be called in. As indicated earlier, we rarely have to use these lists.
I look forward to hearing more about your project in due course.
Yours sincerely
Revd Jayne Shepherd
Head of Spiritual Care and Chaplaincy Services
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