The Wayne E. Oates Institute is a Connected Learning Community exploring spirituality and health as a way to advance integrative care for the whole person. The Oates Institute is a non-profit educational organization made up of caregivers from the medical, spiritual and counseling communities providing a forum for joining together as an interdisciplinary dialogue toward understanding the relationship between spirituality and the healing process.

The Oates Institute is pleased to announce that this year’s featured speaker for the Caroline Lynch Forum on Healing is Dr. Jane Thibault, a

Less than a year ago Dr. Thibault was diagnosed with Stage 4 non-Hodgkins Lymphoma and since that time has been challenged to activate her own spiritual resources, while living with the awareness of a life-threatening illness. It is with great integrity that Dr. Thibault will speak during this forum that is named in honor of the life and giftedness of Caroline Keller Lynch. Dr. Thibault writes,

As a healthcare professional and medical school faculty member for nearly 30 years, I have encountered many persons who have had to deal with the onslaught of cancer in their lives – either as patients or caregivers. My own father died at the age of 63 of laryngeal cancer when I was 15. However, for some reason, I never dreamed I would ever hear the words, “You have cancer.” Perhaps some magical thinking led me to believe that dealing with my parent’s struggle with the disease would make me immune to its presence in my own life. Yet, in the spring of 2009, I was informed by an ER physician that I had Stage 4 non-Hodgkins lymphoma. That was the end of ‘normal’ life as I had known it for 62 years! Something new was required to enable me to deal with the shock, the treatment, and the ongoing uncertainty of life itself.

After the initial feelings of numbness and unreality, I quickly had to make decisions with my husband to activate our inner and outer resources. Decisions related to the ‘outer’ resources, which included the oncologist, type of treatment, insurance benefits, home help, etc. had to be made immediately. However, back home after a two-week stay at Baptist Hospital, with an eight-month chemotherapy treatment plan underway, I was suddenly facing another decision that had to be made --- what kind of meaning was I going to assign to this interruption of the plan of my life --- an interruption which might result in an earlier death than I had anticipated?

Realizing that I would need to activate my innermost, spiritual resources to enable me to create meaning, I sought a metaphor for my life with cancer. I didn’t like the war or victim/survivor images, since this cancer wasn’t an alien, but part of me. I decided to consider my life with cancer as a ‘pilgrimage,’ which could serve to deepen my appreciation of my God-given life and might ultimately take me to the face of God. This presentation is an account of my pilgrimage thus far.

Charge for the event is $20 per person and includes a buffet lunch, the presentation by Dr. Thibault, and the opportunity for dialogue with colleagues in pastoral care, counseling, nursing, health ministries, social work, medicine, and other therapeutic fields.

This Caroline Lynch Forum on Healing honors the life and giftedness of Caroline Keller Lynch and recognizes the deep friendship and healing nature of the relationship between Caroline Lynch and the Institute’s namesake, Wayne E. Oates. It is jointly sponsored by the Oates Institute and the family of Dr. Ted N. Lynch.

To make your reservation for the April 8 Caroline Lunch Forum on Healing with Dr. Jane Thibault, click on the link below or call 502.459.2370.

MAKE RESERVATIONS ONLINE NOW

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