« Back to Issue 53

Supporting dying children & their families

Reviewed by Ministry Today Reviewers.

This book is a useful resource for Chaplains and Ministers alike. It is a reference book covering a difficult, rare subject – supporting dying children and their Mums, Dads and siblings. There are many real life stories and, courageously, real names are used. Alongside these, Nash has written his insights and experience of many years working in a Children’s hospital as Chaplain.

He gives his insights from ‘death certificates’ to ‘what not to say’, and provides helpful poems, prayers and funeral service outlines.  He writes his theological views acknowledging how child bereavement is the worst type of bereavement, but he demonstrates how God is in every heart-breaking situation with love and hope.  He also explains how to break the news of a death, or how to help parents to do so, to a young brother or sister.  Nash provides many useful tools on grief, and points the reader to studies undertaken on how siblings at different ages are affected.  It is a book packed with invaluable insights and guidance; it has certainly helped me as Chaplain at a Children’s hospice.

I commend this book. It is an education on a specialised subject and therefore very useful for Ministers as well as Chaplains, as we never know when we may face a pastoral situation in which we may have need of the resources offered by the author.