Curriculum for a Spiritual Pathway Project: Integrating Research Methodology into Pastoral Care Training

In the immediate future Chaplains will need to practice evidence based spiritual care. To do this, they will need to be well versed in the research literature on spirituality and health, be able to critique it and incorporate it into their spiritual care, document their intervention, and measure its impact. To help train Chaplains for this reality, the Penn State Hershey Medical Center's Clinical Pastoral Education Residency program started the Spiritual Pathway Project in 2002. This paper describes the Spiritual Pathway Project, its evolution and contribution to the education of the next generation of Chaplains.