'Beginning Chaplaincy' - residential courses in Oct and March 2022 at St Padarn's, Cardiff

Are you a new or recently appointed health / social care chaplain? Then this course may be of interest to you…

Beginning Chaplaincy (residential) Course, St Padarn’s Institute, Cardiff
Saturday 9th October - Wednesday 13th October 2021 (inclusive)
Saturday 5th March - Wednesday 9th March 2022 (inclusive)

Beginning Chaplaincy is a five-day induction course for chaplains engaged in health or social care. It has been designed around the experience and needs of newly and recently appointed chaplains. Beginning Chaplaincy complements in-house induction programmes and local management. The course supports chaplains in being safe and effective practitioners, able to make a distinctive contribution. Beginning Chaplaincy is built upon the UKBHC Competencies Framework. All chaplains and volunteers are welcome to apply, regardless of their religion or belief.

More information, including contact details, can be found here and the application form here.

You can also find out about St Padarn’s postgraduate chaplaincy courses here.

(cover photo courtesy of Matheus Ferrero at Unsplash)

Bonded by Blood - A Mother's Story... Important campaign and webinar 29th September

We are sharing news of this important campaign, on behalf of the NHS Blood and Transplant services, which includes the opportunity to attend a webinar on 29th September.

NHS Blood and Transplant are pleased to announce our latest Black donor recruitment campaign - Bonded by Blood.  A Mother’s Story. This campaign is brought to you by ACLT (African Caribbean Leukaemia Trust), Unsickle My Cells, SickleKan and The Richard Okorogheye Foundation and is supported by NHSBT and is in memory of Richard Okorogheye, the 19-year-old young man who first appeared in the national news in April 2021 after disappearing from his home in London.  Richard had sickle cell and needed regular blood transfusions to stay well.  Sadly his body was found 2 weeks later, 20 miles away from home in Epping Forest.

To remember Richard, Bonded By Blood, a coalition of mothers (including Evidence Joel, Richard Okorogheye’s mother) who have seen the lifesaving power of blood first hand and blood charities are urging our Black communities to step forward and donate blood. The number of Black people donating in recent years has grown but to meet hospital demand and to provide the best blood match to patients, we still need more. This year we need 16000 new donors of Black heritage to help treat the majority of 15,000 sickle cell patients in the UK. We will be running Blood Donation Sessions in Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol and London over the next 3 weeks coinciding with both World Sickle Cell Awareness Month (September) and Black History Month (October).

Zoom Stakeholder Webinar – Bonded by Blood Campaign Briefing

We would also really like to encourage you to join a Zoom Stakeholder Webinar.  This campaign call will give you an insight into Bonded by Blood and outline the ways that you and your organisation can support the campaign: Wednesday 29th September at 5 pm.  You register to join using the following links (also featured in the toolkit). After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.

Topic: Stakeholder Campaign Call - Bonded by Blood.  A Mother’s Story

When: Sep 29, 2021 05:00 PM London

Register in advance for this webinar:

Campaign Toolkit

 To access more information about the campaign and get involved by sharing our campaign assets – please access our Bonded by Blood Toolkit here.

(cover photo courtesy of Amir Esrafili at Unsplash)

Connecting Communities, Serving People, The Church & Social Cohesion

Connecting Communities, Serving People, The Church & Social Cohesion will take place on the afternoon of 30th September and be hosted at Liverpool Town Hall.

This event flyer is available to download HERE.

'Leave them certain' is the theme of this year's 'Organ Donation' Week

Leave Them Certain is the theme for this year’s Organ Donation Week.

Organ Donation Week is coming up later this month. This is an awareness raising week from 20th - 26th September. This campaign aims to encourage us to talk to their loved ones about organ donation as families are always involved before organ donation goes ahead, so that when we die, we can leave them certain about our wishes… That conversation could be the most powerful thing you ever do to help save lives!

ORGAN DONATION WEEK

For further information about this year’s campaign and how you, your churches and your families can get involved in the discussions about this vital issue.

This is an issue which matters to all of us and we are glad that a couple of years ago Free Churches Group, working with the Blood Transfusion and Organ donation services, facilitated a one day conference with our member churches and groups. This was a useful event to help us to raise the profile and importance of these services, particularly for our churches who have members from Black, Asian and other ethnic communities. We would like to continue to encourage more blood and organ donors from Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities to come forward to meet the needs of patients from across our communities. Certain conditions, such as sickle cell and thalassaemia, are more prevalent within these communities.

(cover photo courtesy of Camilo Jimenez at Unsplash)

Praying for our Schools - let's join together on 28th September

Pray for Schools, Free Churches Group and partners are joining Pais and Youthscape for the National Day of Prayer for Schools. This will be a lunchtime prayer session over Zoom. All are welcome!

When: Tuesday 28th September | 12.30 - 1.15pm

Click the button below to find out more & register for this prayer event:

(cover photo courtesy of Fa Barboza at Unsplash)