This episode features an interview with Anne Vandenhoeck, who is the director of the European Research Institute for Chaplains in HealthCare (ERICH) and initiated with her team the international survey on chaplaincy during the first wave of the pandemic. Anne used to work as a chaplain in several hospitals and is currently teaching pastoral care and spiritual care at the Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium. Anne is also part of the faculty of ISPEC. To learn more about the project, go to: www.chaplaincyresearch.eu
Where is God?: The COVID-19 Pandemic in a Mission Hospital in Cameroon
I am a staff chaplain working with the Cameroon Baptist Convention in Cameroon –Africa. Since 2017, like other chaplains and religious leaders in this country, I have spent a tremendous amount of energy caring for people who are suffering and displaced because of an on-going civil and genocidal conflict between Anglophone separatists in Southern Cameroon and the official government of Cameroon.
Continue ReadingRealistic Hope, Not False Hope: Prophecy and COVID-19
On 13 March 2020, the first case of Coronavirus was confirmed in Nairobi, Kenya. This was two days after the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a global pandemic, spreading fast and causing death globally. Ever since, life in Kenya has not been the same again. The clarion call, “stay at home, stay safe” has coloured the screens in our living rooms.
Continue ReadingThe Right Tools, Skills and Partners; Liberation Leadership & COVID-19
From the time COVID-19 was confirmed as a global pandemic, there have been a number of social, political and economic injustices taking place in homes and societies. Millions of people across the world cannot find any peace of mind as they are in one way or another oppressed. This is either directly by the COVID-19 infection or indirectly by its social, psychological, economic, political and religious effects.
Continue ReadingLet’s Slow Down: Framing the COVID-19 Pandemic as a Sabbath event
Singapore is a city state that sits at the crossroad of East and West, a major transportation hub and a global financial center. So, it is not surprising that Singapore was one of the first countries to report cases of COVID-19. Initially, Singapore contained the virus well; the aftermath of the 2003 SARS outbreak prompted the government to have extensive plans in place.
Continue ReadingFacing and Re-Imagining Ourselves in the Era of Coronavirus
Continue ReadingThen Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people.In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent.’ For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’”And the Lord said, ‘Listen to what the unjust judge says.And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?
Luke 18:1-8