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During 1 point in my life, I moved to change jobs. I looked for a rental in a new town, while my wife stayed behind to ready our house for sale. I had been given the name of a landlord to speak with. As soon as I met with the landlord, I noticed something unusual about her. I felt compelled to ask, “Are you involved with a ministry?” As it happened, she was an ordained minister who held services every Sunday for the campers who frequented the campground she owned. In essence, she was a chaplain.

Perhaps you’ve experienced something similar. Maybe you sensed that a person you met was unusual somehow. It may be something difficult to describe. Something inside of you, your soul, already knew the answer. You came to recognize their divinity.

The guidelines for chaplaincy is still growing and evolving. It continues to be a creative reaction to ever-changing conditions. Individuals are not static. People go through their days doing what it is they need to survive. People may move, travel, go to school, get married, get sick, get better – they live. On occasion, jobs require folks to travel which may make it hard go to worship services regularly in their own community. This is a place that chaplains are able to fill a void. A few places in which chaplains can be found are:

Major truck stops along major highways.

Emergency response teams.

Retirement communities.

College and school campuses.

Police or fire departments.

Hospice centers.

In the United States, most chaplains are based in Christian faith groups. For the 1st part of the twentieth century, the armed forces only recognized 3 religious groups as chaplains: Catholic, Protestant and/or Jew. Sometimes, Unitarian chaplains could slip through claiming to be Protestant. The armed forces have since widened their scope to involve Wiccans and Muslims as well. Hospitals and hospice centers have also followed suit.

Another trend has been the increase of local pastors and religious or spiritual leaders also making themselves available to businesses and schools to work in a “chaplaincy” role. Since the rise of crazy shootings in schools, along with additional violent happenings, this has become much more necessary. To learn the way to create a new church, I one time went with a mission team to Baltimore. The police dept. gave us a bus tour of Baltimore, as a portion of the program. As we drove by a school, the police officer told us the Baltimore school system was asking pastors and other religious or spiritual leaders to come onto the school campuses to work as “chaplains.” The mere presence and counsel from chaplains greatly reduced the levels of violence in the schools.

Change continues to be an inevitable part of life. Modernism has been replaced by something called “post-modernism.” Communities have become more integrated, both culturally and religiously. Being a child growing up, I became aware that folks tended to gather in communities based upon commonalities, such as income, culture and backgrounds. Much more frequently than not, a single religion dominated. Fiften years ago, my community was 80% Catholic, 10% Episcopalian and the rest had been a mix of Protestant, Jew and no claimed religion. Now the county has about 50 percent Catholic with the remainder filled by Protestant, two Jewish congregations, Unitarian, Christian Science, Mormon, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and various new age groups.

The chaplain has been facing a greater variety of individuals together with differing spiritual paths. Today’s chaplain must possess a lot of religious or spiritual tolerance. It is also essential that today’s chaplain must know as much about different religions as possible to best serve the needs of their flock. One tool that the chaplain can have in his or her arsenal has been completion of the Master of Comparative Religion class as a result of of the ULC Seminary. Knowing where others are coming from is essential if you wish to converse competently with them and minister to them. Authors Naomi Paget and Janet McCormack have this to say about it:

The need has been great.

You find hurting individuals everywhere. Belonging to any hospital, there are lonely people, sick or dying, who are need to be comforted. For the people who work nights and weekends, they're not able to go to services together with people of the same faith. Professionals like police or firefighters need someone occasionally, to pray with or to seek understanding whenever evil rears its ugly head.

A chaplain can help come to those who have been hurting. That unique minister is still seen as the “keeper of the sacred” for those who have been unconnected to a religious congregation. For those who're alone or afraid, a simple blessing, thoughtful word or caring touch does more than you can imagine.

A Chaplain’s job is to ‘keep the sacred’ – this is done by ministering to other people. As The universe has given life, we go and take care of that existence. God – The Universe – All that's Divine, honors and accepts a ministry of the heart. It is the very definition of Divine Glory. To learn more about becoming a chaplain, visit the ULC Seminary’s Chaplaincy Program.