December 2025
An Orientation Brief for New Endorsers of Chaplains
The Marsh Institute collaborates to equip, support, and advocate for chaplains in diverse and global settings, thereby empowering chaplains worldwide. The Marsh Institute strongly affirms the responsibility and value of faith-based endorsers and offers this brief in a collaborative spirit to work closely with them. This orientation brief builds on Dr....
December 2025
The Role of Endorsers in Chaplaincy: Stewardship, Advocacy, and Future Challenges
The Marsh Institute collaborates to equip, support, and advocate for chaplains in diverse and global settings, thereby enhancing chaplains' competency and effectiveness. We solicit thoughtful discussion and respectful dialogue among chaplains, endorsing bodies, organizations, and institutions to think critically about issues affecting chaplaincy and its future. Author: Dr. Jim Spivey, Adapted...
Happy 97th birthday, Dr. Gerald Marsh!
Happy 97th birthday, Dr. Gerald Marsh! You have shown us what it truly means to have “The Heart of a Chaplain.” The countless chaplains you have trained and taught over the years continue to carry your legacy into places of deep need. Dr. Jim Spivey and I remain deeply grateful for...
September 2025
Culture Change in Hospice: A Call to Return to Its Foundations
Author: Dr. Rich Behers, BCC, CFHPC CPE Training Supervisor/Educator, The Hospice Chaplaincy Resource Center (HCRC.store) EXECUTIVE SUMMARY Hospice has drifted from its founding ethos—holistic, interdisciplinary, mission-driven care inspired by Dame Cicely Saunders—toward a narrow, medical-reimbursement model. The predictable outcomes are visible everywhere: declining family satisfaction, higher turnover, and staff burnout. Reversing...
Upcoming Webinar: Engaging Institutional Leadership Following a Death by Suicide
In the wake of a tragic death by suicide within any institution, the role of caregivers (e.g., chaplains, ministers, and counselors) becomes both urgent and indispensable. The death of a member, a leader, a chaplain, a pastor, or other identifiable leader within any institution creates a huge ripple effect. How...
August 2025
Marsh Institute for Chaplains & Digital Theological Library Launch Global TranslationInitiative for The Heart of a Chaplain, 2nd Ed.
SAN ANTONIO, Aug 20, 2025 — The Marsh Institute for Chaplains and The Digital Theological Library announced this week a strategic partnership to translate The Heart of a Chaplain: Exploring Essentials for Ministry, 2nd Edition, into multiple languages. This initiative brings together the Marsh Institute’s experience in chaplaincy formation and...
February 2025
Marsh Institute featured in Baptist Standard
Organizers announced the formation and launch of The Marsh Institute for Chaplains, a nonprofit organization dedicated to collaborating, equipping, supporting and advocating for chaplains in diverse settings. The Marsh Institute builds on five and a half years of work of the Gerald E. Marsh Center for Chaplain Studies, a chaplain-focused endeavor...
January 2025
The Art of Sharpening the Tool of Chaplaincy — A Collaborative Approach
“As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another” (Proverbs 27:17 NIV). Preparing a chaplain for tomorrow’s ministry is like sharpening a woodworking hand tool. A chisel or hand plane is indispensable to achieve ‘fine woodworking’. Wood craftsmen of old, void of power tools, understood not only how to use such...