A Carer's Guide: How to worship with a group of residents

How do we look after ourselves and others better in the wake of a health crisis such as Covid-19? This Carer’s Guide series offers practical help and guidance to carers who find themselves needing to provide spiritual support to older people or others in residential care. The aim of these guides is to give you the confidence and skills to enable those in your care not only to cope emotionally and spiritually but even to thrive, despite challenging circumstances.

This guide shows how even if you’ve never been to church you could still help people to worship and hold your own mini church service with a group of residents.

Debbie Thrower, Founder and Pioneer of Anna Chaplaincy for Older People, says: ‘Some of the lessons learned by Anna Chaplains are shared here so that spiritual care – along with medical, practical and emotional care – becomes accessible to all.’

Catriona Foster has spent the last 13 years working as a pastor for older people, based in a large Anglican church in Birmingham. She spends much of her time visiting older people in their own homes or in residential care homes, as well as running events, faith courses and leading worship services for older adults and people who are living with dementia. She loves to see older people flourishing emotionally and spiritually, even in the face of difficulty and loss.