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Clinical pastoral education

What is clinical pastoral education?

Clinical pastoral education (CPE) is spiritual/theological and professional education for ministry. In CPE, seminarians, ordained clergy, members of religious orders and qualified laypeople minister to people in the hospital (and other settings) while being supervised. This education program is guided by the mission and values of Community Health Network, the Department of Pastoral Relations (Chaplaincy), and the Clinical Pastoral Education program in a satellite agreement with Clarian Health Partners, Inc. We are committed to providing a superior clinical pastoral education program.

The CPE learning environment

CPE is a supervised educational process through which the minister, priest, rabbi, imam, religious or layperson learns the art of pastoral care in a clinical setting. Ministry opportunities are offered through service lines of a comprehensive and integrated health care delivery system: cardiovascular, oncology, women and children, medical/surgical units, neuroscience, emergency medicine, rehabilitation services and behavioral health. Pastoral care is provided to patients, family and staff through the student chaplain interns.

Out of intense involvement with CPE supervisors, hospital staff chaplains, other students, people in crisis and other professionals, CPE students are challenged to grow in their personal and pastoral functioning. This growth is enhanced through pastoral practice, written case studies and verbatims, didactics, an interpersonal relations group, and individual supervision. Through viewing complicated life situations from different viewpoints, students are able to gain new insights and understandings about themselves and others. Spiritual/theological reflection is important in CPE as pastoral persons seek ways to integrate spirituality/theology with life experience. In addition to a number of hours of classroom instruction and interaction, CPE students are required to provide a minimum of 300 hours of pastoral care on their assigned clinical units. All this adds up to the CPE unit requirement of 400 hours: 300 in ministry; 100 in individual and group supervision.

Programs

Community Health offers Level I CPE, an introduction to personal development and basic pastoral care skills; and Level II CPE, a more advanced program of personal and pastoral functioning. Community Health Network currently offers two programs of CPE:

• Summer Intensive Program. Early June - mid-August (11 weeks). Seminars and Ministry, M-F, 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Some overnight and weekend on-call duty for the four Indianapolis hospitals in the network.
• Extended Unit Program. There are two 16-week extended units of training. The fall unit begins in early September and lasts through early January; the winter unit begins in late January and lasts through mid-May. Class meets from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. one day per week, generally on Tuesdays. Students must also complete 20 additional clinical hours in the hospital. Students' on-call schedule is twice monthly from 4:30 p.m until 8 a.m., and one weekend (Friday 4:30 p.m. until Monday 8 a.m.).

The CPE supervisor

The Rev. Dr. Edgar “Eddie” Hennig has been with Community Health Network since August 2008. He is an ordained minister, a Certified Supervisor with ACPE, a Board Certified Chaplain with the Association of Professional Chaplains and a Diplomate in the American Association of Pastoral Counselors. In addition to 30 years’ experience as a CPE Supervisor, he has served as a pastoral minister, missionary and pastoral counselor.

Who may apply

Qualified applicants are seminary students and/or ordained, licensed or commissioned clergy persons who have successfully completed one year of seminary education in an accredited theological school and are currently enrolled in a degree program, or a member of a vowed religious community, OR a layperson who has completed an undergraduate degree or has some theological education and has been engaged in pastoral care and/or is preparing for pastoral ministry.

Fees

• Application fee: $25.00 non-refundable (If applicant is accepted into the program this fee is applied towards the tuition fee.)
• Tuition: $500 per unit of CPE for Summer and Extended programs

Application procedure

The process for selecting applicants is continuous, or based on a rolling admissions policy. Applicants are encouraged to apply as early as possible. In submitting applications, please use the ACPE application form (PDF). Please add your SOCIAL SECURITY NUMBER to the face sheet (needed for processing the application in the Community Health Network system). Upon completion of the application, send a hard copy with the $25.00 application fee in a check or money order made out to “Community Health Network” to:

Rev. Dr. Eddie Hennig
ACPE Supervisor
Pastoral Relations Department
7150 Clearvista Drive
Indianapolis, IN 46256

Chaplain Hennig’s phone number is 317-621-5988. The fax number for the department is 317-621-7056.

Accreditation

Community Health Network is a provisional satellite of Clarian Health Partners, Inc. located at I-65 at 21st St., P.O. Box 1367, Indianapolis, IN 46206. Clarian Health Partners, Inc, is an accredited institution to offer CPE by:

The Association for Clinical Pastoral Education, Inc.
1549 Clairmont Rd, Suite 103
Decatur, GA 30033
Phone: 404-320-1472
Fax: 404-320-0849
E-mail the ACPE