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Faith and Diversity

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Health Care Provider and Faith Diversity
Jill Gillespie
Nursing 310 V
Spirituality in Nursing

Introduction:
As nursing professionals, we are in constant contact with persons from many walks of life and who have unique spiritual and religious backgrounds. To give quality holistic care, nursing professionals need to be understanding and compassionate about these differences and respect the diversification of the patients that we treat. By having an open mind and actively seeking the knowledge to provide unbiased and compassionate care that incorporates each individual’s spiritual faith. To begin to understand differences between spiritual beliefs, three distinct faith practices were compared to the traditional Christian faith. Buddhism, Shintoism and Bahai philosophies were examined through patient interviews to gain the knowledge needed to provide compassionate nursing.

A Christian perspective on Healthcare:
Christianity is a religion of personal experiences. It is a spiritual movement, not a lot of theories or "isms." It is a movement of life, truth, the Holy Spirit, and love. The important thing is to have a personal, real experience. Through the right relationship with God we can recognize and understand the Lord's will. There are many ways in which we can experience God's blessings. I recommend fasting and prayer as the most powerful of these. The Bible has much to say about fasting and prayer. Joel wrote, "Therefore also now, saith the Lord, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning: And rend your heart, and not your garments, and turn unto the Lord your God: for he is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repenteth him of the evil" (Joel 2:12-13).

Interview With patient with faith in Buddhism:
1) What is your spiritual perspective on healing?
From the Buddhist

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