June 28, 2021
This year’s annual conference themed “Creating Room to Breathe” challenged all of us to reflect how we as an organization and as individual members can commit to anti-racist practices.

The Board of Directors of the Foundation for ACPE is engaging several initiatives that follow through on our commitments and “put our money where our mouth is.”
I hope this note finds you well as we slowly move out of the disorientation of the pandemic to the reorientation of our personal and professional ways of life. I know that many of us are deeply engaged in summer programs and are busy preparing for the fall. I am excited to share a few of the important things that are happening within the world of accreditation.
Think back to your experiences at ACPE conferences. The plenary speaker is stimulating. The workshop makes you wonder. The panel offers a tantalizing idea. In the hallway you engage your peers in a rich conversation about how all of this works for students. It is this conversation that stays with you. There is that colleague with whom you want to follow-up. You do, and something new is added to your curriculum, a resource is discovered to foster your students’ learning. The ACPE Curriculum Committee would like to replicate part of this "hallway experience" with an online Resource Room series.

The first Resource Room, "On the Matter of Moral Injury for Spiritual Caregivers," will be available on Sharepoint on Friday, July 23 starting at 12:30pm ET.
During our legal due diligence process, our attorneys advised us that we could not proceed with our published timeline. According to Illinois state law, where APC is incorporated, any membership vote must include the proposed bylaws and governance structure.

Instead of seeing this legal opinion as an obstruction, we view our current situation as an opportunity to further elicit member feedback. We remain committed to the proposed merger. We believe a merged organization will excel at meeting tomorrow's cultural realities, serving our members and communities, and advocating for the practice of spiritual care and education.
Recently, ACPE and APC announced a change to our published timeline for the merger. Although our process changed, ACPE leaders remain committed to the proposed merger. We believe a merged organization will excel at meeting tomorrow's economic and cultural realities, serving our members and communities, and advocating for the practice of spiritual care and education.
ACPE Certified Educator Rabbi Jo Hirschmann published a new article titled "CPE for leaders: Adapting Clinical Pastoral
Education’s learning methodology for healthcare
managers and directors" in the Journal of Health Care Chaplaincy. ACPE Certified Educator David Fleenor was one of the contributors on this study.
Are you a retired Certified Educator looking for opportunities to remain connected to colleagues and the work of spiritual care and education? Then please consider joining the newly forming Council of Elders CoP. The next meeting will be Wednesday, July 7 at 2pm Eastern.

Contact Katherine Higgins (Katherine.Higgins@acpe.edu) for more information.
We invite all ACPE Certified Educators who are working with Educator Candidates to join us for informal consultations and conversations via Zoom in 2021. 

The drop-in meeting (no RSVP required) will take place on Mondays, beginning from 12:00pm to 1:00pm Eastern time.
In Case You Missed It
Having come to the end of our historic annual conference, I am reflecting on the talent among us, how that is nurtured and encouraged. What a gift to hear the voices of newer educators and particularly those who are pushing and leading us to make anti-racist commitments in our lives and ministries.
Once a month the ACPE Professional Ethics Commission (PEC) posts a couple of statements from our Code of Professional Ethics for ACPE Members.
Deadline to Declare: August 26
Deadline to Upload Materials: October 1
Meeting Dates: November 1-5
Weekly Highlights
This Week's Reflection
Life’s journey in many ways is one of diving deeper and deeper into the core of who we are. As Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.” Mark Nepo invites us through his poetry into those depths, often with simple and direct language. How many clients in counseling or students in CPE have struggled to practice accepting what they have been given even as they have struggled to ask what they need?
Attempts
by Mark Nepo

When the old life is
burning, everything will
smell like ash for a while.
So trust your heart,
not your nose.
Trust the music of the
ages to surface what’s left
way inside. Wait like a
cello for each rub to
bring you closer.
Learn how to ask for
what you need, only to
practice accepting what
you’re given. This is our
journey on earth.
It seems one of the casualties of the last few years has been a shared understanding of facts and truth. How do you know if someone is lying? Are there physical manifestations of dishonesty that can help us better know when we are “being played”? Here’s
a great article from the editors at JSTOR, including a quick chart that identifies several qualities, some of which may surprise you:

This Week on the Calendar
June 28
Apostles fast begins (Orthodox Christianity)
The Holy Apostles Fasting duration varies every year. It may last from zero days, if Pascha falls on May 3 or later to twenty-nine days, if Pascha falls on April 4 to May 2.

July 1
Jashn-e Tirgan (Zoroastrianism)
Celebrated in mid-summer invoking the rains to enhance the harvest and counter drought.
This Week in our Thoughts
  • no news to report

Visit the ACPE Memorials and Milestones page for more details. Please email webmaster@acpe.edu to add someone to our thoughts.
CAREER & RESIDENCY OPPORTUNITIES
Trinity Health Of New England is looking for a CPE Educator to join our team of mission-driven healthcare innovators.
University Medical Center New Orleans is proud to be a leader in medical care.
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.