Hampshire Anna Chaplain Carol Kidd has written a terrific article for Plus, the magazine of Christians on Ageing. It’s in their current autumn 2022 issue, and Carol describes a typical day:
‘A day as an Anna Chaplain can include preparing and leading a care home or sheltered housing service, making “buddy” phone calls, liaising with care navigators regarding a referral via social prescribing, network meetings with the pastoral team or other chaplains and making home visits to provide company and a listening ear, which sometimes includes end of life or bereavement support.
‘The variety of the role makes being an Anna Chaplain so meaningful. It is both humbling and inspiring to encounter and serve older persons from such a wide range of backgrounds and living within so many differing circumstances.’
She describes coming alongside people living with dementia, being with another someone who ‘due to a stroke can no longer write but asks for help filling in the answers they know to a cryptic crossword’.
Or, for instance, she might spend time with ‘a blind 102-year-old who has so many wonderful stories to tell but insists they do not want to “be here anymore”’, or with a person ‘frail in body, but sharp of mind’ who is a younger care home resident and who resents their family ‘putting them away’.
In all such circumstances, an Anna Chaplain has to think on their feet, try and find the right words, or even display the courage to stay silent and just hold someone’s hand… if that seems the appropriate thing to do. Carol makes clear what a privilege she feels it is to serve in such a way and that in being sent by her church she can be confident that Jesus goes before her into all these different and sometimes difficult situations:
‘I was commissioned in November 2021,’ she writes, ‘and the role dovetails well with my parish duties as pastoral team coordinator. Even more so, Anna Chaplaincy adds the joy of being sent out to serve in the wider community, not with an aim of adding to church attendance, but as in serving wherever the Holy Spirit leads, meeting people where they are, whilst knowing that Jesus always goes before. I firmly believe that friendships and support networks formed through Anna Chaplaincy are inspired, encircled and enriched by God’s love.’
Carol is a retired midwife and she comments on how many new retirees like her step into such an Anna Chaplaincy role post-retirement. However, there are more and more younger recruits too. Gradually more paid posts are appearing which is enabling some younger people to devote time to this important ministry among older people, their relatives and professional carers. Either way, age is no barrier!
If you would like to read Carol’s six-page article in full you can do so. One automatically subscribes to the magazine Plus when joining Christians on Ageing. Membership costs £18 a year. The quarterly magazine may then be read either online or sent to you as a hard copy through the post.
Anna Chaplains come from many different denominations. Carol Kidd is an Anglican licensed lay minister (LLM or reader) at St James’ West End and Anna Chaplain in Harefield and West End, Southampton.