Reflections on AJRCA’s Spring 2025 Spiritual Care & Education Seminars
By Rabbi Sarah Barukh
AJRCA hosted a Chaplaincy Conference on March 19th and 20th focused on the theme, “The ‘Art’ of the Matter: The Integration of Art in the Provision of Spiritual Care.” Conference participants represented diverse professional and educational settings – professional chaplains, rabbinical, cantorial, and CPE students, ACPE educators, and mental health practitioners were among those in attendance.
The learning began with an experiential poetry seminar, followed by an exploration of the varied ways art can be utilized in spiritual care on the institutional level and at the bedside. Spiritual assessment and intervention, fine arts, music, dance, writing, and spiritual growth as creative process were some of the resources explored. Participants also had the opportunity to integrate their learning into practice through interactive case study exercises.
Several positive remarks were shared in the post conference survey:
“I really appreciated Dr. Trina’s session on poetry because it was so hands-on and interactive. Same with Rabbi Barukh and Keri Olsen’s modules–they both had a lot of interactive aspects that I found very valuable.”
“Lots of new ideas of how to approach and incorporate the arts.”
“I appreciated learning more about chaplaincy care and integration of creative arts in meaning making. I also enjoyed learning more about religious texts.”
“I appreciate the interaction, humility, and vulnerability of the presenters. The discussions with participants were also intelligent and rewarding.”
“Case studies and their discussions were rich.”
“I loved that each of the presentations was interactive, and left space for dialogue/questions. I also loved the participation of those in attendance! Everyone seemed willing and excited about engaging.”
“Mix of creative exploration, with frameworks for practice and case examples.”
The conference aimed to create opportunity to not only learn about various art resources, but to experience them, and gain practical opportunity to integrate them. I think we achieved these goals based on participant feedback. On a personal level, the opportunity to experience various art interventions over the course of the conference allowed me to feel firsthand how powerful these tools can be on the receiving side. I have not historically used a lot of art in my practice of spiritual care (or have done so with great hesitance) – the presenters inspired me to be more bold in offering these resources. The high level of participant engagement also contributed greatly to the richness of the learning over the course of the two-day conference.