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Daybook -- Today is Monday, January 8, 2007, in Epiphany.
* Today in Scripture: Daily Office meditation: http://www.forwardmovement.org/todaysreading.cfm * Today in Prayer: Anglican Cycle of Prayer: http://www.anglicancommunion.org/acp/index.cfm * Today in History: On this day in 1854, Thomas Fielding Scott was consecrated the first missionary bishop of the Oregon and Washington Territories. http://www.diocese-oregon.org/history
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Diocesan Digest
COLORADO: Priest inhibited during financial investigation http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_81001_ENG_HTM.htm
VIRGINIA: Episcopal parish reorganizes, elects new vestry http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_80999_ENG_HTM.htm
More Diocesan news: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_19507_ENG_HTM.htm
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People
Linda Tyson joins Berkeley Divinity School at Yale staff http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_81009_ENG_HTM.htm
More People news: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_78001_ENG_HTM.htm
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Mission: Parish nursing heals 'body, mind, spirit' in local congregations
[ENS] On any given day, Carol Sullivan of St. Anne's Church in Annapolis, Maryland, may check a blood pressure, make a house call, serve as patient advocate, teach CPR classes, train volunteer caregivers, lead a support group for first-time mothers, write newsletter articles, chart nursing notes or oversee the parish prayer shawl ministry.
"There's no such thing as a typical day," says Sullivan who about four years ago parlayed more than 30 years of professional experience into what is becoming a growing vocation in the Episcopal Church: parish nursing.
"Parish nursing is important because today the health care system is not about health, it's about disease. It's not about caring, it's a system," she said. Assisting St. Anne's 900 families in navigating the health care system is a large part of Sullivan's vocation.
"I spend a lot of time making sure people know what's going on, that they understand their options, and have enough help when they go home from the hospital," she said.
"I go with people on their first oncology visit, where they stop listening after the first two minutes because there is too much information and they need another pair of ears of someone who understands the lingo. Or if they have to go to rehab I make sure I know where they are. People can disappear into long-term care, never to be seen or heard from again."
Parish nursing is a response to "a strong biblical call to heal body, mind and spirit. It's what Jesus did, but it's still very much under the radar screen," she added.
But the National Episcopal Health Ministries (NEHM), a network of nurses, health ministers, chaplains, clergy, health professionals, and lay health ministers in the Episcopal Church focused on health and healing through the local congregation, hopes to change all that.
Full story and photograph: http://www.episcopalchurch.org/3577_81007_ENG_HTM.htm
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Catalyst: "Mark My Word: Forty Days with Jesus Through the Eyes of St. Mark" from Cowley Publications, by Richard Giles, 119 pages, paperback, c. 2005, $14.95
[Source: Cowley Publications] -- "Who is this Jesus, who wanders onto center stage in this earliest of the Christian Gospels?" Richard Giles responds to this question with a 40-day meditation and commentary of the Gospel of Mark. Brimming with insight and Giles' signature wit, Mark My Word reviews the events and teachings related in the Gospel, and provides a 21st century lens through which to understand it. Each daily reading is followed by reflection questions and a closing prayer, making Mark My Word perfect for individual devotional use and group reading.
To order: Episcopal Books and Resources, online at http://www.episcopalbookstore.org or call 800-903-5544.
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