The Wayne E. Oates Institute is a Connected Learning Community exploring spirituality and health as a way to advance integrative care for the whole person. The Oates Institute is a non-profit educational organization made up of caregivers from the medical, spiritual and counseling communities providing a forum for joining together as an interdisciplinary dialogue toward understanding the relationship between spirituality and the healing process.

Performing spiritual assessments is part of the daily routine for chaplains and the search for more efficient approaches that can be utilized by multiple disciplines is ongoing. Dr. Larry Austin has developed an approach to spiritual assessment that is a SNAP and he will present it during one of the Oates Institute's online seminars April 12-30. According to Dr. Austin, "This online seminar will discuss the basic categories of spirituality and will explore how these themes work their way through the human pastoral encounter. We will explore the chaplain / patient visit and work to identify strategies for identifying and working with spiritual issues in the context of an advanced assessment model."

Since those actively engaged in ministry are not immune to the experience of depression or anxiety, the Wayne E. Oates Insitute is offering an online seminar April 12-30 specifically designed to assist with addressing these issues. This seminar will provide pastors, chaplains, and pastoral counselors the opportunity to acquire information through several featured presentations and will provide a safe environment for shared reflection with the presenter and other participants through asynchronous email discussion.

With Spring just around the corner for those of us in the northern hemisphere--and Fall for those in the southern--April is a great month for connecting with colleagues around the country for continuing education opportunities.  Whether you log in from your neighborhood coffee shop, your office, or the beach on Spring break, connect with others for a peer learning experience around pastoral care, ethics, counseling, or ministry in these changing times. From April 12-30, 2010, the Oates Institute is offering a wide selection of lifelong learning for ministry opportunities that you may participate in according to your schedule from anywhere you have Internet access.

Registration is now open for the April online seminars. Seven seminars will be offered, each beginning on Monday, April 12, and continuing through Friday, April 30. The seminars will offer presented resources, which may be read or viewed at your convenience, and peer group conversation reflecting on these resources and providing the opportunity to learn from each other, also according to your schedule.

Wayne E. Oates Institute board members gathered February 11 and 12 for our first ever national board meeting. Board members living primarily in Louisville, Kentucky, joined new board members in San Antonio, Texas, for this historic meeting.

As a result of this time together in San Antonio, WEOI Board Chair Jan Shockley said, "The bonding that happened as a result of our being together for an extended time was invigorating and exciting!  The freedom to brainstorm as we looked to the future brought fresh ideas and approaches.  The new board members brought great energy as they shared their ideas.  All of these points reinforced our decision to expand our board to the Texas area."

Compassion Fatigue: Caring for the Caregivers is the topic for this year's annual online conference at the Oates Institute. The dates for the conference, which will combine online presentations with real time as well as asynchronous discussions, will be November 10-19, 2010.