MultiCare Health System

Our Chaplains

The role of our chaplains is varied. We do not impose any particular set of religious beliefs on families. Mostly, we listen and endeavor to help patients cope with the questions raised by their illness, encouraging them to talk about their concerns and discover their own meaningful answers.

Sometimes, patients need to vent their feelings—with someone who will not judge them. Feelings of anxiety, anger, frustration, and sadness are normal. Indeed, there are patients that need to "rage, rage against the dying light," as one poet put it, before they can move to more serenity of spirit.

On other occasions, our chaplain's role is to help the family (and other caregivers) become more sensitive and responsive to the patient's needs, enabling them to be more caring, supportive and understanding.

If it is the patient's wish, we will read to them and/or offer prayers appropriate to their tradition of faith. (Our chaplains represent a wide variety of religious traditions.) Rituals also may be performed—if they seem to be a source of comfort.

Our primary purpose is to provide patients with someone who is fully present and authentically caring, helping them to walk through "the valley of the shadow of death" with dignity and grace.