Honoring Our Wishes through Advance Health Care Directives and Considerations for One’s Funeral Service
Dying is a privileged occasion to explore the meaning and value of life and to deepen our relationship with God. As Christians, we are called to consider our mortality faithfully and responsibly, giving our loved ones the gift of making known our choices for end-of-life care and death.
Saturday, March 2nd @ 9:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m. in Scott Hall at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church
In-Person Only
The first portion of this workshop will enable you to start the conversation about communicating your end-of-life care preferences to health care providers and loved ones through advance medical directives and proxies. Stephanie Hamilton, MDiv, BCC at VCU Health, will explore the need for and resources available to make clear, legally binding medical care decisions about end-of-life from a medical perspective.
The second portion of the workshop will focus on funeral planning specifically within the Episcopal Church. The Rev’d Dr. Charles T. Dupree, St. Paul’s Rector, will lead us in a conversation about what to consider as you think about your own funeral. Using the Book of Common Prayer as a framework, he will walk you through the various options. It’s better for you to make these decisions sooner so that others will not have to make them on your behalf later.
Stephanie Hamilton
Stephanie Hamilton serves as the VCUH Coordinator for Bereavement Services and the Faculty Chaplain Liaison for Surgery/Trauma, and the Emergency Department.
A native of Kingston, Jamaica, she completed high school in Grand Cayman; her Bachelor of Arts at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, in 1981; and her Masters of Divinity at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky in 1990. She completed her Chaplain Residency at UNC Chapel Hill’s Trauma Center in 1991 and was ordained in 1992. She worked as a Chaplain at hospitals in Monroe and Charlotte North Carolina, before moving to Richmond. She began at VCU in the fall of 2000 as one of the Clinical Faculty, as Adult Bereavement Coordinator and Coordinator for the Annual Good Grief Conference.
She is endorsed with the Alliance of Baptists and became Board Certified as a Chaplain with the Association for Professional Chaplains in 2005. Over the years at VCU she also served as the Family Communications Coordinator (FCC) Team Leader and as the Trauma, E.D., Neuro, Surgery Faculty Liaison with CPE Chaplain students, and with staff in those areas. She moved to Bon Secours in February 2012, where she served as the Lead Chaplain with St. Francis Medical Center and as a member of the Critical Incident Team with Bon Secours. She returned to VCU in 2016, as FCC Team Leader and Clinical Liaison with the Surgery Trauma Neuro Service Line.She has published in the area of staff support after national crises, and provided presentations on crisis, grief, communication, charting, and the role of the FCC Team at VCU.
She and her husband Mike have two children, Jonathan and Carrie. Stephanie enjoys dancing, camping and digging in the yard.
Please register by Tuesday, February 27th. Contact the Rev’d Keli Shipley Cooper at kshipleycooper@stpaulsrva.org with any questions.