Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) is a way of learning and improving one’s ministry and/or pastoral skills through experience and reflection in a clinical setting. CPE incorporates students and ministers of all faiths and traditions who are guided through their clinical experiences by their supervisors. By visiting patients, and receiving feedback from peers and teachers, students develop new awareness of themselves as persons and learn how to better serve the people whom they minister to.
As one of the sites in the Partners Healthcare CPE System, Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) provides a great environment for CPE students to work in. The diversity of BWH provides students with challenges and experiences of all kinds.
Our Supervisors and students create a climate where students can grow as pastoral caregivers and as persons. Learning occurs within a relationship that is characterized by trust, challenge, respect, and commitment and is founded on the spirituality of both the supervisor and the student. Learning does not occur solely through the transmission of ideas from supervisors to students. The interpersonal relationship between supervisors and students is critically important. Through this relationship, the supervisor seeks to model pastoral ministry and to facilitate the student's willingness and ability to discover their ability to function as a chaplain and forge their own ministerial identity and style.
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