Connect program centered on empathy, listening

For Dr. Patricia Fosarelli and Dr. Brian Volck, health and healing are intrinsic to the patient’s faith as well as the physician’s.

But simple effective communication can be a miasma of misunderstandings and missed signals for those who fail to understand cultural differences, specific religious beliefs, or, particularly with African-American patients, a longstanding distrust of the medical community based on years of being ignored or exploited.

The most effective care involves empathy. Empathy means actually listening. And actually listening in a multicultural environment requires training.

That’s the thinking behind the interdisciplinary “Connect: Faith, Health and Medicine” program beginning this fall at St. Mary’s Ecumenical Institute on the campus of St. Mary’s Seminary and University in Roland Park. 

The yearlong certification course, in-person and online, mostly on Fridays and Saturdays, is geared toward health professionals, hospital chaplains and anyone who works in or is interested in pastoral care and healing. It is resuming after being postponed during the coronavirus pandemic.

The graduate study program is intended to bridge gaps between faiths as well as teach what healing means in the Christian tradition. The term “holistic,” often overused in education, here has a real application.

For instance, “What is the goal of health care?” asked Volck, trained as a pediatrician and a parishioner of St. Vincent de Paul in Baltimore. “How do we practice it in our daily lives?”

Fosarelli, a parishioner of Corpus Christi in Bolton Hill who has taught pediatrics at The Johns Hopkins University Medical School in Baltimore, said her most memorable previous class involved a student raised in the Christian Science tradition, which teaches the “law of truth,” healing the sick on the basis of one mind or God.

“She certainly learned a lot about what Catholics believe about health care,” Fosarelli said. “It was lively all the time.”

Fosarelli is also the director of the master of arts in Christian Ministries program at St. Mary’s Ecumenical Institute.

Volck said the “real emphasis” is that people will learn new behaviors and new perspectives, or learn the Christian perspective on health and healing.

One of the classes, “What People Believe Matters” covers Muslim, Hindu and Jewish beliefs. It comes down to having “an experience of being with people they’re not used to being around,” Volck said. He’s found that “students are just overwhelmed, because they have no idea about others’ beliefs.”

Another component, Fosarelli said, examines how different religions regard death, dying and grieving. 

“We talk about the importance of interpersonal care and listening to what people are saying,” she explained.

Classes include: “Health, Healing, and Human Flourishing in the Biblical Narrative,” the “Faith and  Health” Movement, “The Imperative of Relationships,” and “The Shape of Curing and Caring in The Christian Tradition.”

Other instructors are Joel Shuman, a professor of theology at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, Pa., and John Hayes, a psychologist and psychoanalyst and a priest of the Episcopal Diocese of Maryland.

Those qualifying for supervised practical education, called a practicum, for the 12-credit graduate certificate can enroll in that either during coursework or in the summer of 2024.

The fees are $5,700 for those getting a certificate, and $2,000 for those qualifying for 100 hours of continuing education. Scholarship assistance is available. The fees are reduced by $120 for those registering by July 1.

For more information, visit stmarys.edu/ei/connect

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