Episcopal Chaplain Marshall Scott has an interesting post on chaplaincy volunteers:
I ended my last reflection on volunteers with the question, "So, what can volunteers do?" For those of us who do call for a high level of quality of care for patients in health care institutions, that is not a simple question. I have suggested that there are a variety of qualifications that we might consider for a person who wishes to volunteer. But, as I have noted, the variety of qualifications simply begs the question.At M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, the chaplaincy department offers qualified volunteers an opportunity to participate in our interfaith lay volunteer programs. These programs are designed to help augment the work of our board certified full-time chaplains by providing a spiritual presence to cancer patients and their families through the compassionate presence of trained interfaith volunteers. If you are interested in serving in such a program, please contact our office at 713-792-7184, and as for our Coordinator of Community Chaplaincy Programs, Rev. Mirjam Berger.Or, perhaps it only appears to do so. I say that because the variety of qualifications suggests that volunteers can do what they’re asked to do and trained to do. That is, there are people out there, and perhaps available, who have one or more of the various qualifications I suggested. Granted, there will be more un- or underemployed folks with CPE who might volunteer in major metropolitan areas. I have a colleague who has a Board Certified Chaplain serving on a volunteer (unpaid) basis. However, the other sorts of preparation I mentioned, from seminary courses to education programs for lay ministry, are widely available, and may well reach into small towns. We speak of folks as "volunteers" because we're not prepared to pay for their service. But that in and of itself doesn't describe the limits of what a given volunteer, with certain individual talents and preparation, might be able to do. Rather, it clarifies the question from "What can volunteers do?" to "What do we want volunteers to do?"
