Hospital preaching as informed by bedside listening

Chapter One observes hospital bedside listening as an important aspect of showing hospitality to the sick. Hospitality in this situation refers to the act of giving the sick the freedom or the opportunity to express themselves and to be listened to. Hospitality also involves sharing the patients' stories with the worshipping community for better understanding. This chapter suggests what the sick can offer the healthy in their conversation and what the sick can offer to the worshipping community.;Chapter Two discusses the skills of achieving a meaningful conversation with the sick, explaining what goes on when two or more people are talking. This chapter also includes some of the relevant theories, reflections, and commentaries of some communication experts on rapport building, listening skills, and the recognition of sensory preferences in conversation.;Chapter Three describes in detail how to apply some of the communication skills discussed in the previous chapter to connect and converse with hospital patients. The application of these skills is to encourage patients to develop confidence in the pastoral minister so that significant stories are shared with the chaplain or pastoral minister. This chapter also includes suggestions for documenting the story after conversation and the ethical implications involved.;Chapter Four explains how a preacher prepares homilies for the hospital community starting from the encounter at the patient's bedside to the writing of a homily that will address the problems of the sick. The preacher takes into account the bedside story as well as the Biblical text.;Chapter Five describes the process for evaluating the effectiveness of the sample homilies preached with patients' stories and those preached without patients' stories. Homilies preached without patients' stories refer to those homilies which focus on the biblical text rather than the encounter with patients and their experiences or feelings. A questionnaire was designed to give patients the opportunity to express how they feel about the homilies. These questionnaires were distributed and later evaluated.