Chaplains in the Workplace

I thank the handful of folks that read my first instalment of my "weekly" blogging. It has become "monthly" since I did not get an overwhelming response the first time around. And no, I am not offended.😢 Last week, Anne and I were able to travel to Alberta and spend time with our boys and their families. A granddaughter, 3 small dogs and 2 wonderful daughter-in-laws. While I was away, 7 residents passed away at the long term care where I am the Chaplain. Before anyone asks, no, none of the deaths were related to Covid. One of the deaths was Violet, who turned 100 in April. She was born 3 months before my mom and she was very proud of her 3 children and grandchildren. I will be officiating her funeral in a few weeks and at least one celebrity will be there: her son Tom Cochrane. A line from one of his songs that you might have heard of: "Life is a highway". And that is what I want to talk about today. We are each on a journey called life and for some that ...

Prior to Covid-19 and all the restrictions that have come with it, I would regularly head out for a ride along in the western part of downtown Toronto. I am a Toronto Police Service chaplain and over the past 18 years I have volunteered at three different times, with the present one starting in 2016. I wear a uniform but no weapons. I do however go to all kinds of calls riding with a different sergeant each time I go out on the road. In Toronto all divisions have their own chaplain. The province of Ontario has over 100 police chaplains and our backgrounds and religious affiliations are varied and thus we call it multi-faith by definition. We have just created the Police Chaplains Association of Ontario where our hope is to formalize the training for all police chaplains. We are doing this with the support of the Canadian Police Chaplain Association which we are all part of. Another purpose for the PCAO is to better define our role to the Police Chief's of Ontario. The hope being th...

Something that seems to have been missed in all the rhetoric coming from various individuals is that social media has no "truth" filters. When you repost something from a so-called expert and that expert is quoting statistics about Covid-19 that totally (not partially) contradict reality, please stop it. You as a Christian are ruining the witness of the Church even as you think you are being "a voice of reason". As you may know, I work in long term care as a chaplain. I have been told by some "mature" Christians that business owners and churches take priority over the elderly in long term care. The reason: "those folks are going to die soon anyway". One who didn't like the Premier of Ontario putting on restrictions, actually called for "civil disobedience". I hope both of these men have reconsidered their words. What happened in Washington a few days ago was a direct result of people, even followers of Jesus, listening to social med...