Belfast Met's Gerry Skelton - Interview on Spirituality

New resource: An interview with Gerry Skelton discussing 'Social Work and Spirituality'. Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE, 2014).

Warmest greetings to One and All. I just wanted to share a few words of gratitude and introduce what I hope will be a helpful resource to your thinking, feeling and practice about the centrality of spirituality in our individual and collective lives.

As many of you are aware, I have been championing the inclusion of spirituality in the social work (and related) professions, and challenging the education, training and practice arenas to embrace this legitimate, nascent but often neglected and 'tabooised' theme. Indeed, I passionately contend that spirituality represents something of a zeitgeist for the 21st Century!

So a BIG thank you to all who have helped me in a myriad of ways; through your personal and professional encouragement, enthusiasm, challenge, and 'believing' in the value of this work and the contribution I have tried to make.

To this end, can I specifically thank the following 4 people for endorsing the wider dissemination of this interview, wherein I addressed spirituality for a Northern Trust 'Celebrating Social Work' event. The Social Care Institute of Excellence (SCIE) has agreed to the inclusion of this resource on their website...and I invite you all to view it, but only after reading these comments.

In humble service and deepest gratitude, Gerry.

"We believe at Belfast Met that Gerry Skelton is exploring new ground that has important outcomes for students and their potential as practitioners. He is attempting to increase their creativity and problem solving ability by assisting them to consider the purpose of what they do. This interview is a powerful mechanism". Marie-Therese McGivern, Belfast Met Principal and Chief Executive. www.belfastmet.ac.uk

"I would encourage anyone to listen to Gerry Skelton's interview about spirituality and social work. His passion for social work clearly comes across and he is able to explain key concepts relating to this important and neglected area in social work in jargon free and easily understandable terms. I would support his call for religion and spirituality to be given greater prominence in the social work curriculum". Dr Sheila Furness, Social Work Programme Director, University of Bradford. Shelia has also published in the area of religion, belief and spirituality -- you can see more at www.bradford.ac.uk/ssis/social-work/academic-profiles/sheila-furness

"In this interview Gerry Skelton defines spirituality and its relevance to social work practice for practitioners and service users, carers and survivors. It is an issue and a set of ideas that was central to many of the founding principles of social work, and it is good to have spirituality re-visited and theorised for the twenty first century. In doing so Gerry poses some critical questions for social work as a profession, and for social educators in particular -- how do we create the space to explore this for ourselves and its relevance to social work in different contexts? I welcome this resource and Gerry's significant contribution, and look forward to the evolving debate about this important issue". Dr John Devaney, Director of Social Work Education, Queen's University Belfast. http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/Schoolof...

"This video provides an introduction to spirituality and highlights the importance of considering the spiritual needs of people who use services. It is a welcome addition to help students and practitioners in thinking and learning about this topic". Dr Shirley Ewart-Boyle, Practice Development Manager (NI) Social Care Institute for Excellence: www.scie.co.uk
The interview with Gerry Skelton discussing the theme of spirituality in social work and related implications can be found on SCIE via: http://beta.scie-socialcareonline.org...