Spiritual health is an integral component of Catholic identity and essential to whole-person care. We seek to support our members in their commitment to caring for the spirit of all those they serve, regardless of their faith tradition. CHA advocates for the highest quality of spiritual care through spiritual care departments and board-certified chaplains. We identify and promote best practices across the discipline. We consult with our members through advisory councils and board-certifying groups to address innovations and gaps that will better serve patients, residents, families and co-workers.
What is Professional Spiritual Care in Catholic Healthcare?
A White Paper on Present Challenges and Opportunities
The Essentiality of Spiritual Care
Can We Strengthen Spiritual Care in Catholic Healthcare? is a reaffirmation of Catholic health’s commitment to spiritual care across our ministries. Catholic healthcare understands the human person as an integrated whole being, with physical, psychological, social, and spiritual dimensions.
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Spiritual/Pastoral Care Articles
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September 2026Compassionate Conversations training teaches doctors how to deliver devastating news with empathy, spiritual support and self-care. -
August 2026In northeast Florida, Ascension St. Vincent's gives seminarians firsthand experience providing spiritual care
The future priests shadow hospital chaplains, building skills, knowledge and connections. -
August 2026Spiritual care teams can play a vital role in addressing healthcare facilities' top challenges, experts say on webinar
Chaplains can provide strategic value, including by addressing workforce morale goals. -
August 2026Spiritual care departments are facing difficult challenges; insights from a survey could point to solutions
During a webinar, spiritual care experts discuss ways chaplaincy can "claim our space in healthcare." -
June 2026Indiana's Saint Anne eldercare campus opens hospice suites to provide holistic end-of-life care
In the newly remodeled wing, residents receive medical, spiritual and emotional support in a homelike setting. -
Fall 2026Mission — Well-Being: So That All May Flourish
As leaders in well-being, the Catholic health ministry is called to foster an environment of healing where patients, co-workers and local communities may flourish. Together, we represent a community of nearly 700,000 associates, united by the healing ministry of Jesus and the enduring vision of our foundresses, dedicated to advancing human flourishing. -
Spring 2026National Survey Highlights Trends and Obstacles to Professional Spiritual Care in Catholic Health Environments
In the summer and fall of 2025, the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) conducted a survey of those working in professional spiritual care within Catholic health ministries in the United States. -
Winter 2026Healthspan: Reimagining Whole-Person Wellness as a Community Goal
As Americans and their health care systems struggle with both escalating costs and the growing complexity of a fragmented payer-provider landscape, a sobering truth looms over this essential social function: Despite operating the most technologically advanced and expensive health care system in the developed world, the U.S. produces health outcomes that lag behind every other industrialized nation — and even some developing ones. -
Winter 2026From Innovation to Imperative: The New Era of Palliative Care Delivery
In 2024, the American Medical Association updated its Code of Medical Ethics to establish that physicians have an ethical responsibility "to address the pain and suffering occasioned by illness and injury and to respect their patients as whole persons. These duties require physicians to assure the provision of effective palliative care whenever a patient is experiencing serious, chronic, complex or critical illness, regardless of prognosis." -
Spring 2025Supporting Patients and Their Loved Ones Coping With Serious or Terminal Illness
Chaka Brittain's mother used to bring her along on her visits to terminally ill people in her community. "My mom was somewhat of a death doula, if you would," she said. "I remember even as a young girl going to people's houses, and they were dying. She'd come in and sit with them and stay with them until they had 'gone to glory.'"
Season 5: Episode 5 - Spiritual Care and Emerging Technology
Emerging technologies can help health care providers with a multitude of daily tasks from efficient data processing to helping doctors with bedside conversations. But can it be used in the realm of spiritual care and whole person care?
Theresa Edmonson, Vice President of Spiritual Health for Providence St. Joseph Health, and Antonina Olszewski, Vice President of Spiritual Care for Mission Integration at Ascension, join the show to discuss the latest trends in technology and spiritual care. The two highlight the recent work of CHA’s Spiritual Care Advisory Council, explain why they feel hopeful about the future of AI in spiritual care settings, and reflect on how the foundresses and founders of Catholic health care can inspire us as we move boldly into the future.
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Spiritual care is not unique to Catholic hospitals and nursing homes, but it is integral to their identity. Catholic teaching lifts the importance of honoring the whole person — both body and spirit — seeing the two as integrally connected. It would be impossible for us to offer Catholic health care without dedicating colleagues to spiritual care. They go by many different names — chaplains, pastoral caregivers, spiritual companions and more. Most are professionals who've prepared for their ministry with years of study and certification. Others are generous volunteers from the local community. All help us to fulfill our mission in an explicit way. And today we give thanks for their presence in our midst.
— Excerpted from A Prayer for Spiritual Caregivers