Parish Nursing

God’s Work: Our Hands

Parish Nursing strives to connect our stories to God’s story. The following scenes make use of story, symbol and ritual to share the ways parish nursing can be life enhancing. Let’s unpack the captions to each scene.

Communicate the Truth - The scene is Ash Wednesday and the words echo, “You are dust and to dust you shall return.” Some of our deepest needs are to touch and be touched, heal and be healed, forgive and be forgiven.

Grasp Health – Points to wellness programs enjoyed by small groups such as these women in the Faithfully Fit Forever class. Sometimes the whole congregation supports one another in exercise through walking and wellness programs we named, “Thirty Good Minutes,” “Soul Steps,” “Journey to Bethlehem” and the “Sabbath Experiment: Living Life 24/6.”

Gently Caress the Fragile – This scene show the ministries of prayer shawls (prayerfully knitted hugs from God). Parish nurses and church members bring the caress of the church to hospital rooms, home visits to the ill, the dying and the recovering. Gentle caresses are found in the infant loss blankets made for area hospitals and in ongoing grief support groups held at church which are open to all in the community.

Set Things Right – Making sure things are in order is a good practice be it blood pressure screenings, diabetes screenings, health counseling or facilitating advance directives and planning for other end of life issues. Parish nurses guide persons in putting their life in order.

Connect Playfully – Parish nurses organize the annual middle school girls sleep over teaching teens and pre teens about the changes going on with their bodies. Parish nurses also teach our pre-schoolers about germs and dental care and they sing and dance with young people at Vacation Bible School providing band aids for the scrapes and bruises that occur when young people gather together.

Weave Community-   We see the window washers who are part of “Neighbors in Action”- a state grant funded program made up mostly of volunteers in the community to care for our elderly and disabled ‘neighbors’ to help them live as long as possible in their homes, safe and with increased quality of life. This community program was built off the volunteer program that nurses began at Prince of Peace and today many of POP members are both recipients and volunteers of the NIA program.

Nursing with Faith- Parish Nurses are experienced professional registered nurses practicing nursing in a faith based setting; helping others to see the interdependency of their body, mind and spirit. Spirituality book club, prayer at the bedside of the ill, participating in healing services, prayer workshops and funerals, are examples of nursing with faith.

Welcoming New Life - home visits to our newest members are a favorite task for parish nurses. Nurses provide a point of contact distributing new parent resources and inviting baptismal planning.

Touch the Holy- acknowledging that everyone is holy and honored and loved, no matter what their situation parish nurses set up meals for people home recovering from a hospitalization. This ensures that people are fed with good food and fed with the gift of community.

Fit Our Neighbor’s Hand - The group handshake is made up of members of the La Crescent Area Healthy Community Partnership whose vision is “to be the healthiest community ‘anywhere’ where people feel useful, valued and have purpose”- a partnership with local businesses, church, school, health facilities, community members. This is a wonderful example of sharing health ministries beyond church doors.

Honoring Our Fathers and Mothers - Parish nurse ministries look toward the elderly and ask: How are they doing? Are their children serving them? When they are old and lying down, do their children come and sing them songs? Parish nurse ministries include accompanying elderly or disabled members of our community to doctor appointments, being a health advocate during doctor appointments when individual has displaced family or are alone, facilitating transition to an assisted living or nursing home facility.

  We want to thank our very talented Adam Beardmore for coming forward saying, “I think we should enter a video and I will create it for you.” Our church staff new the quality and dedication of Adam’s work and quickly said,”Let’s go for it!” We had about 2 weeks to get it done! We decided, as a church staff, to feature the Parish Nurse Program since it would be unique and it would have a great message! In one very God filled day we filmed the scenes for our video “God’s Work Our Hands- Through Parish Nursing”. Denine Rood gladly gave permission for us to use her amazing song, “Someday Soon” for the video. Through Adam’s magic and spirit, he masterfully edited the scenes with Denine’s song into this 90 second video!

Thank you to all who got us to the top 10 ratings in order for the judges to view our video! It was by you, your family and friends going to the web site and voting that got us there! Thank you!

And a special thanks to our actors and actresses! In order of appearance were, Janet Las, Bev Nelson, Cathy Beardmore, Cindy Gross, Denine Rood, Dixie Forsberg, Mary Newburg, Jan Berg, Marlene Froegel, Shirley Heeter, Pat La Rue, Marion Engelhart, Rose Doering, June Benton, Darlyne Dwyer, Jeff Rood, Cassidy Woods, Laura and Annie Jackson, Paige Pasvogel, Kjersta Hinz, Anna Peterson , Darlene and John Erickson, Jennifer and son Mason Conroy , Michelle Tetzlaff, Marge and John Haugan, Dale Ambuehl, Molly and Erin Dunlap, Eileen Krenz, Larry Pupp, Judy Storlie, Sandy Graves, Barb Bennett, and Marie Morken.  Due to the need to keep the video to 90 seconds, 4 scenes were deleted. Adam is creating a longer version of this video that will include all scenes that will be used on our POP Web site, and for future PN awareness events. Thank you to the actors and actresses: Linda Heintz, Jim Howe, Terresa Bubbers, Herb and Angie Henning, Joan Francois, Linda, Karen Woods, Ingrid Fowler, and Kris Tripp. Also thanks to Cathy Beardmore for being Adam’s assistant and cheerleader, David Thesing for helping with a lot of the church scene setup the day of filming and Pastor Mike for his creative wording introducing each scene. It was a great day!

Denine’s song from the video, “Someday Soon” will be available to the public ‘someday soon’! Go to www.deninelibkerood.com for more information on her upcoming beautiful CD!

So…we now have $5000 for ministry at POP and the concept of Parish Nursing has made a name for itself in the ELCA! God is soooo good!

Blessing, Bev and Linnea