2nd Intl. Conference of the EP for Pastoral Health Care

(Ecumenical Patriarchate) - The 2nd International Conference of the Ecumenical Patriarchate for Pastoral Health Care will be held in Rhodes, Greece, between the 12th and 16th of October 2011. The conference is being organized, with the blessings of His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, by the Network of the Ecumenical Patriarchate for Pastoral Health Care.

The theme of the Conference will be “Caring before the Gates of Death”. The presentations and workshops will focus on death from a medical, theological, philosophical, psychological and pastoral perspective. There will be a special emphasis on palliative care and the medical, psychological and spiritual care which is offered to those that suffer incurable diseases and who are in the last stage of their life.

It is indeed a fact that the care which is offered to those that are before the “gate of death” is becoming even more complex and difficult. Because of this, there are many theoretical issues that must be explored, questions that must be answered and many practical steps that must be taken so as to offer the care that every person deserves.

Attending the conference will be representatives from all the metropolises that belong spiritually and administratively to the Patriarchate throughout the world, the representatives from the metropolises of the Church of Greece and of the other Autocephalous Orthodox Churches, representatives from the Schools of Theology of the Universities of Athens, Thessalonica and Holy Cross in Brookline, Mass, including other theological schools and ecclesiastical academies. Also attending will be those that are involved in the medical care (doctors, nurses, social workers, etc) for the sick and the dying...

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