On Tuesday 22nd October, we held the 5th Growing Old Grace-fully online session of 2024, Spiritually Accompanying People with Dementia led by Rev. Dr. Joseph Cortis, co-author of Journeying Together: accompanying people living with dementia. Deacon Joe has a background in adult and mental health nursing which includes a long period as an educational manager, academic and senior lecturer at the University of Leeds. He is a Trustee of Growing Old Grace-fully and a Deacon of the Diocese of Leeds.
The session explored ways to provide spiritual support to individuals living with dementia as well as our own spiritual journey with them as a loved one. It includes prayers and reflections, as well as ideas as to accompany and support someone living with dementia from a spiritual perspective.
It was a very powerful session and we thank Deacon Joe for leading it.
You can watch the whole session on YouTube here.
There is a one page summary of the session, produced by Deacon Joe, that you can download here.
Further Resources
For those who would like to read it, the book, by Rev. Dr. Joe Cortis & Dr. Pia Matthews can be ordered here.
In addition, in 2019 Deacon Joe led a Dementia Awareness workshop, which can be found on the Caritas Leeds website here.
This page also links to several useful resources and links, regarding dementia.