Award for Parish Nursing Ministries UK
Parish Nursing Ministries UK received a boost in the latest Christian Funders Forum awards after collecting a silver award in the ‘Best Rural Project’ category
Parish Nursing Ministries UK helps local churches appoint nurses, who in turn support people and communities towards whole person healthcare.
Parish nurse founder, Baptist minister Helen Wordsworth, collected the award alongside Baptist parish nurse Jessica Pitt from Mildenhall, Suffolk and advocate Dr Robert Wordsworth at the event at Westminster Central Hall.
‘This award recognises the immense contribution that Parish nurses are making to health and spiritual care, across all denominations, with all age-groups, and in rural, urban and suburban communities,’ she said.
‘We hope it will help us towards the achievement of our vision of a Parish nurse in every community, complementing both the work of the NHS and ministry teams, providing a bridge between the health needs of the community and the work of the local church.’
Currently there are 106 active parish nurses around the UK. Helen said that the number is growing steadily, as the mission value of this community based health outreach is experienced, and the professional support available from Parish Nursing Ministries UK provides confidence to both churches and NHS professionals.
Around one third of the churches that have a parish nursing service are Baptist.
One Baptist deacon says that although it was initially difficult to get unanimous agreement to commence this work for one day per week, the appreciation of the nurse’s care for all both in and outside of the congregation is so positive that church members are now asking for more hours to be offered.
The cost is not great given the potential for outreach and spiritual care. Baptist Insurance has now offered to help churches with funding by inviting them to apply for a grant, and in some areas Cinnamon start up grants are available.
A free, no obligation, enquiry pack is available from enquiries@parishnursing.org.uk
The Christian Funders’ Forum is a group of Christian grant makers whose combined giving to Christian mission is more than £30million per annum. Visit http://www.christianfundersforum.org/
Related
Parish nursing continues to grow Thirteen more nurses prepare to work with their churches, extra training courses have been organised and a Grove booklet produced (November 2016)
Baptist Times, 04/01/2018