Faith leaders in Northern Ireland, as a consequence of their pastoral work, are a population with high exposure to trauma. This can profoundly impact their wellbeing and their capacity to care for others. Journey Towards Healing continues to offer faith leaders evidence-based trauma awareness training, seeking to help them recognise trauma and its impact within the lives of others, as well as within their own lives.
Through a widely distributed booklet and its developing research strand, Journey Towards Healing hopes to cultivate an ongoing process of reflection on trauma and its impact on individuals and communities in Northern Ireland. The programme also hopes to provide an international platform* to encourage dialogue about the relationships between spirituality, religion, faith, conflict, violence, trauma and healing, in Northern Ireland and beyond.
The Journey Towards Healing Committee & Key Reference Group currently consist of mental health practitioners and faith leaders from the 4 main Christian traditions in Northern Ireland: Presbyterian, Church of Ireland, Catholic and Methodist, as well as faith leaders from Jewish and Muslim traditions. Working with Journey Towards Healing are political and community leaders from across all sectors of Northern Irish society.
This multidisciplinary team - through a common focus on the human experience of trauma and wellbeing - provides a uniquely holistic approach to trauma recovery in Northern Ireland.
We are committed to cultivating a process that will positively contribute towards sustainable peace for future generations.
This platform has taken shape as the Journey Towards Healing International Conference
9-13th March 2011 to be held at The Europa Hotel, Belfast. Please consider joining the conversation. All are welcome. More information is available by clicking here to be taken to the conference website.
Irish Dominican Sister
Director of Social Witness, Presbyterian Church in Ireland
Anglican priest, Church of Ireland
Training and Development
Officer, Egdgehill Theological College, Methodist Church in Ireland
Psychotherapist
International psychiatrist
Personal Assistant to Peter McBride
Journey Towards Healing Programme Coordinator
Contact Colleen D. Brown, Journey Towards Healing Coordinator
Since 2004, Phase 1 Journey Towards Healing Training has been offered to faith leaders and other pastoral workers who are encountering people with experience of trauma.
This training draws upon the information in the Journey Towards Healing booklet - presented via powerpoint and explored through dialogue with participants. The training experience, available as full or half-day, moves through the following 8 stages:
The training hopes to be a means of support for anyone involved in pastoral care, and for those they encounter who are suffering as a consequence of traumatic experience. At the end of the training day, the experience will have expanded participants' awareness about trauma and its impact, and increased their resilience.
The training is offered free of cost, thanks to funding from OFMDFM.
For more information, to request a booklet or to coordinate a training, please contact Colleen D. Brown, Journey Towards Healing Programme Coordinator. Click here
2010-2011 Phase 2 Training is currently running with 12 pastoral workers, exploring 10 modules. Each module combines trauma theory and best practice trauma care models, and includes a facilitated group reflection process.
This module will introduce the holistic framework that Journey Towards Healing has developed for understanding the impact of trauma on the whole person: mind, body, spirit, relationships, community, and social fabric. This framework sets the foundation for the entire course.
This module will focus on latest research findings for the impact of trauma on the mind (neurology) & the body (biology), and on the relationship between mind & body (neurobiology).
This module will particularly explore the impact of trauma on mind, body & spirit, as a whole, with a focus on the impact of trauma on faith and spirituality.
This module will explore the impact of trauma upon relationships and communities.
This module will bring into conversation different experiences of the relationship between 'trauma and faith' in various parts of the world, including: Northern Ireland, South Africa, the Balkans, Israel/Palestine, and the Americas.
Building on an experience of examining the universal (global) and particular (local) dimensions of the relationship between 'trauma and faith', this module will provide a time to go deeper into understanding the particular context of sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland, and explore the particular impact of sectarian conflict trauma on the whole: mind, body, spirit, relationships, communities, and the social fabric.
This module will provide a time to integrate learnings and key questions since May.
This module will begin a process of applying useful learning into one's own ministerial context, with the goal of supporting the development of a strategic pastoral plan for one's own community (i.e. designing a workshop, a speaker series, a retreat, developing an infrastructure for a pastoral team, etc).
This evening is for each course participant to present their own strategic pastoral plan to the group. Members of the Journey Towards Healing Committee will also be present. Ideally, this presentation will be practice for a group presentation of Phase 2 work at the 9-13 March 2011 Journey Towards Healing International Conference, in Belfast: Trauma & Spirituality: An International Dialogue.
This evening will be a meal out to celebrate and bring Phase 2 (2010-2011) to a close.
Four Main Christian Churches in Northern Ireland:
