By Slugsie, on April 8th, 2009I heard this on the radio this morning on my journey to work. The National Secular Society is calling for all Hospital chaplains (of any denomination) to be funded by the Church rather than by the Hospital.
Obviously, as an atheist, I’m reluctant to let any of my tax (or National Insurance in this case) pounds be used for any theistic purposes. So to that extent I do support the calls of the NSS. I have no problem with chaplains per se, and I’m quiet happy for them to visit hospital patients and their families if called upon to do so. I just don’t want to be paying for it.
There is one other point however that I’d like to touch on, and my views may be slightly surprising. In the radio interview, the chaplain (whose name I didn’t catch) mentioned that their services do form part of a ‘whole body healing’ service. He claimed that patients who were subject to the services of a chaplain had a much better recover rate. I did cough slightly at that statement, but then I thought on a bit. Obviously, such a claim should be subjected to a properly controlled scientific study, and anything that can aid the healing/recovery process needs to be encouraged. The thing is however, there is already some data that may support this position – sort of. Investigations into the efficacy of ‘Complementary and Alternative Medicines’ (CAM) seem to indicate that there is a small improvement above and beyond what can be explained from the placebo effect. This improvement isn’t down to the actual medicines themselves, but is due to the fact that CAM practitioners are often more able to spend time just being with the patient. The human body does have amazing powers to heal itself, and anything that makes the patient feel happier and cared for can assist the overall healing process. Because of this it’s just possible that chaplains can be beneficial. But so could doctors and nurses if they were able to spend more ‘bedside’ time. So could anyone whose job was just to go round the wards, and be a friend to the patients.
I wonder, can we have atheist/humanist chaplains?
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April 8th, 2009 | 
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The NSS would tell you that no, you can’t have state-funded atheist/humanist chaplains, because that breaks secularist principle just as much as religious chaplains. But yes, you can have atheist/humanist hospital visitors or counsellors.
Dan
Dan, you’re right of course. That last line was supposed to be a bit tongue in cheek. I should have put a
at the end.