July 7, 2011
The Orlando Sentinel today reported on a growing trend among churches to hire nurses on staff to promote the wellness of their congregations. In Florida, the Winter Park Health Foundation has awarded more than $500,000 in grants to support local faith-community nursing programs, so more and more churches are putting nurses to work in the church to oversee nutrition programs, run small groups on depression and wellness, and counsel congregants on family health issues. The article said “an estimated 40 to 60 Central Florida congregations now have a nurse who works with them, although some are unpaid.”
Diana Silvey of the Winter Park Health Foundation commented, “We need to integrate health into where you work, where you play and where you worship. One of our nurses found that she could tell patients the same thing their doctors did, but people were more receptive to the nurse because she was part of that faith environment. It’s a good fit.” A parish nurse at Redeemer Lutheran hired under the program, Denise Schmalzle, said people ask her what she does all the time. “Parish nursing is different in that it’s really promoting wellness, instead of treating someone after they become ill.” Schmalzle says she recently counseled a group of toddlers on the topic that “their body is a wonderful creation of God.”
Wellness programs are becoming more and more popular in churches—even Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church in southern California, announced recently that his congregation lost a total of 200,000 pounds in a wellness program started last year, in hopes the surrounding community would see how the church is concerned with “real needs.”
