Spiritual Care

Our mission
The mission of the Spiritual Care Program at Children's Hospital of Wisconsin is to enable patients, families and staff to identify, recognize and use the spiritual and religious resources available to them for hope and guidance during difficult times.

Spiritual Care Services
To carry out our mission, the Spiritual Care staff at Children's Hospital strives to provide the following support services to patient families 24 hours a day, seven days a week:

• Personal visitations to provide spiritual support to children and their families.
• Compassionate care for patients of all spiritual traditions.
• Help, support and spiritual reflection through life changes brought about by sudden and chronic illness.
• Prayer and blessing.
• Sacraments such as Holy Communion and emergency baptism.
• Religious books, videos and devotional resources for patients and their families.
• Connections with local worshiping communities.
• Ministry for the dying and their loved ones.

How can Spiritual Care help?
Children's Hospital understands that a visit to the hospital, no matter how "routine" the visit, can be a very stressful time for families. Families often find themselves asking and wanting to discuss some of the following questions:

• Why my child?
• How do I cope?
• How can I keep going?
• Does anyone care?
• Where is God when it hurts?
• What does it mean?

Families often find it helpful to visit with a chaplain when a member of their family is:

• Newly admitted.
• Preparing for surgery.
• Needing to contact their pastor, rabbi, imam or elder.
• Waiting for test results.
• Receiving a new diagnosis.
• Undergoing difficult treatment.
• Making hard decisions.
• Needing someone to listen.

Spiritual Care staff

Mary Kay Balchunas, MTS, MSW, BCC Chaplain Mary Kay Balchunas, MTS, MSW, BCC is a Board Certified Chaplain who completed her clinical pastoral education at St. Luke's Medical Center in Milwaukee with an emphasis on critical care and oncology in 1994-1995. She has provided spiritual care services to Children's Hospital of Wisconsin patients representing a wide variety of faiths since 1997.
James Greear,  M.Div., BCC Chaplain James Greear, M. Div., BCC is a Board Certified Chaplain who completed his clinical pastoral education at North Carolina Baptist Hospital in Winston-Salem with an emphasis in pediatrics in 1994-1995. He has provided spiritual care services to Children's Hospital of Wisconsin patients representing a wide variety of faiths since 2002.

Dr. Alexandra Guliano, BCC
Dr. Peg Nugent, BCC
Rev. Michael Matheny
Dennis Kubena
Richard Cook

Spiritual Care volunteers
Previous pastoral care training is required for Spiritual Care volunteers. For more information about volunteering for this program, call Children's Hospital's Volunteer Services at (414) 266-2180.

Contact us
Family Services Department
(414) 266-2800

Chaplain Mary Kay Balchunas
(414) 266-2354

Chaplain Jim Greear
(414) 266-2395

A chaplain is available 24 hours a day. To reach the on-call chaplain, call (414) 266-2000.