SHARE:  
July 11, 2022
It’s that time of year again…time to submit your CoP’s budget and funding request to the Professional Well-Being Committee.  We are excited to see 2023 bringing us all back together after such a long pause.  

The Professional Well Being Committee is pleased to again have the opportunity to see the excellent work and plans that our Communities of Practice are planning for 2023. While it would be our dream to fund every single effort you have designed, unfortunately, we know that funds are limited.  The committee will make every effort to support all qualifying requests to the extent possible. 
Over the past few years, COVID-19 has greatly impacted the field of healthcare and our CPE programs. Anecdotally, we have been hearing from some programs that are growing in number, from some programs that are having trouble filling their residency positions, and others that are finding it challenging to fill spots in their intern units. To gain a better understanding of what our centers are facing in light of the lingering impact of COVID, the current state of the economy, and multiple other challenges in our world, we are asking centers to share information with us about your programs.
You are invited to participate in a research study.

The purpose of the study is to investigate why many mental health providers have chosen not to integrate neuroscience into their clinical practice. Previous research has suggested a lack of neuroscience knowledge and integration among mental health professionals, but no study has addressed contributing factors to this choice. This work will measure the relationship between several counselor or clinician characteristic variables and their choice to use or not use neuroscience in client case conceptualization and treatment planning to inform this gap and to inform future research in this area.
This is a time of unprecedented access to high-reward, high-dopamine stimuli: drugs, food, news, gambling, shopping, gaming, texting, Facebooking, Instagramming, YouTubing, tweeting . . . The increased numbers, variety, and potency are staggering. As such, we’ve all become vulnerable to compulsive overconsumption. Yet, it is possible to find contentment and connectedness by keeping dopamine in check.

In this talk, Professor Anna Lembke will provide a practical, science-informed approach to addressing compulsive overconsumption of everything from food to sex, to video games. Q&A will follow Dr. Lembke’s presentation.
Save the Date: Arts Community of Practice 2022 Conference
The Arts Community Of Practice is planning a 2022 Conference on October 5/6. There will be virtual and in-person options for participation. Two keynote speakers will make presentations. One on The Theory of Arts in CPE (Lauren Frazier-McGuin) and the other on The Role of Music in Community Healing (Karl Paulnack). A third presentation will be arranged by the local site coordinators. Registration information will be forthcoming. For now, mark your calendars!
Certification Fall Docket Dates 2022
  • August 31, 22 – Deadline to Declare Intent to Meet Certification Subcommittee
  • email Sheilah.Hawk@acpe.edu
  • October 3, 2022 – Deadline to Submit Electronic Materials
  • November 7, 9, & 10, 2022 – Subcommittee Docket Dates
Once the Letter of Intent is received in the National Office by email, the Aspirant will be invoiced for the $100 meeting fee. Payment of meeting fee must be received on/before October 3rd.

Contact Sheilah Hawk at Sheilah.Hawk@acpe.edu with questions.
In Case You Missed It
SAVE THE DATE: Curriculum Resource Room in July!

Curriculum Resource Rooms are open to CECs and Educators. Please mark your calendars and join us!
The Leadership Development Committee (LDC) invites you to consider serving in one of the open leadership positions in 2023. Nominations are open now for ACPE’s fall election. The deadline to submit a nomination is August 1, 2022. Read more
Have you provided support to co-workers requesting a religious exemption to the COVID-19 vaccine or been involved in reviewing exemption requests? If so, you are eligible to participate in a new research study. If not, but you know a chaplain who was, please forward this invitation to them. Read more
We invite all ACPE Certified Educators who are working with Certified Educator Candidates to join us for informal consultations and conversations via Zoom. The drop-in meeting (no RSVP required) will take place on the first and third Mondays of the month, from 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm ET. Read more
Weekly Highlights
This Week's Reflection
For many students, their first unit of CPE took place in the summer, probably in a healthcare setting. Towards the middle of the unit, it is not unusual for some of life’s biggest questions to begin to surface, demanding attention and reflection. In these transitional days from the COVID-19 pandemic into something new and not quite normal, Lynn Ungar, a UU minister from Vancouver, WA offers these lovely words (note: if these ring true, you might also want to read her poem “Pandemic”):

The Way it Is
by Lynn Ungar

One morning you might wake up
to realize that the knot in your stomach
had loosened itself and slipped away,
and that the pit of unfulfilled longing in your heart
had gradually, and without your really noticing,
been filled in—patched like a pothole, not quite
the same as it was, but good enough.

And in that moment it might occur to you
that your life, though not the way
you planned it, and maybe not even entirely
the way you wanted it, is nonetheless—
persistently, abundantly, miraculously—
exactly the way it is.

Ever look back at some of the brilliant innovations of days past and wonder, “What were they thinking?” This seems like a great example of just such an effort:

This Week on the Calendar
As a part of ACPE’s commitment to anti-bias practices in all dimensions of our work, a subcommittee of the Anti-Bias Work Group has recommended we stop publishing a “holy days” calendar, recognizing that all efforts will be inadequate and may unintentionally reinforce privileged perspectives for some while inadequately representing others. Instead, ACPE will focus on:

  • Promoting educational inclusion and exclusion,
  • Deconstructing the Christocentric history of the ACPE,
  • The impact of how our US context is also predominantly Christian,
  • the intersections among racism, xenophobia, and religiously based oppressions, and
  • the implications of the increasing secularization/shift to pluralism and spiritual but not religious (SBNR) values in US society.

We encourage you to reference these and additional resources as both educational tools and when planning programs and events (note: careful reading of the tools at these links will illustrate the above points, but as such could foster good conversation within your programs and practices):
Memorials and Milestones
  • Retired ACPE Educator Rev. Amos Kempton Haynes, Jr. ("Kempton") died on June 28th in his home. A reception in his honor will take place at Kings Bridge Retirement Community on July 17th at 1:30 PM.
Visit the ACPE Memorials and Milestones page for more details. Please email webmaster@acpe.edu to add someone to our thoughts.
CAREER & RESIDENCY OPPORTUNITIES
Ballad Health is seeking a full-time Manager, ACPE Educator in Johnson City, TN. View more
Chaplain resident program at Elmhurst Health in Naperville, IL. View more
Other Educational Opportunities
ACPE: The Standard for Spiritual Care & Education
ACPE is the standard for spiritual care and education. Our diverse membership includes Certified CPE Educators, Spiritually Integrated Psychotherapists, Spiritual Care Professionals and Practitioners, Pastoral Counselors, Chaplains, Faith Communities, and Seminaries. Our multi-disciplinary, multi-faith, multi-racial community of professionals provides education, connection, and formation through continuing education, networking, and leadership development.
 
ACPE is the premier, Department of Education recognized, organization that provides the highest quality CPE programs for spiritual care professionals of any faith and in any setting. We do this through a rigorous accreditation and certification process for centers and educators that provide CPE.
 
The depth of our training enables students to realize their full potential to strengthen the spiritual health of people in their care as well as themselves.
 
ACPE members are actively engaged in a wide variety of professional development activities including communities of practice, conferences, spiritual care research, and informal networking. We are more than just an association: we are a movement committed to the transformation of the human suffering.Our opportunities for formation and community enrich our member's work of healing and transforming people and communities in the US and across the globe.