Bringing cheer to Methodist Family Health
12/04/09HEATHER HAHN
Editor
While leading a children’s Bible study last December at Methodist Behavioral Hospital, Scott Moore asked the elementary-aged patients what they were most looking forward to that Christmas.“Spending time with family,” one youngster said. “Christmas dinner,” another piped up. The kids kept calling out the sort of holiday-card sentiments they thought the chaplain wanted to hear.
Moore interrupted: “Am I the only one here who likes to get presents?”
All the children raised their hands except one little boy.
“You don’t like to get presents for Christmas?” Moore asked him.
“I’ve never had a Christmas present,” the boy said quietly.
Moore assured the boy that this Christmas would be different.
On Christmas morn, gifts bearing the boy’s name were waiting for him beneath the hospital’s tree.
As Methodist Family Health’s director of pastoral care, Moore plays Santa to more than 200 children and young mothers. He works with the state’s United Methodist churches to ensure that everyone in Methodist Family Health’s care — from the behavioral hospital in Maumelle to the ministry’s other programs around Arkansas — gets a reminder of Christ’s love on Christmas day.
The ministry, which grew out of the Methodist Children’s Home in Little Rock, now provides mental-health services for children and families statewide.
These services include therapeutic foster care, emergency shelter, outpatient counseling, acute psychiatric care and Arkansas CARES (Center for Addictions Research, Education and Services), a residential treatment program where women overcoming drug addiction can stay with their children.
Last year, the ministry served some 2,300 people, many struggling with destructive behaviors.
Spiritual outlet
Moore provides outlets for these clients and staff to express their faith. He leads weekly Bible studies and spirituality sessions such as labyrinth walks and drum circles. He also arranges for church groups to lead a time of worship or Christian instruction for the children in inpatient care on the third and fourth Sundays of the month.
Moore said his main duty is simply to listen.
“My approach is to listen to what they have to say without judgment,” he said. “Sometimes I kind of confront them with behaviors, but it’s in a loving way. Just in the nature of their jobs, the therapists have to be hard on them sometimes. They need to confront these issues. The therapists are trained to say this is what you’ve got to do. I say, ‘Have you considered this?’”
To reach his clients, Moore must frequently travel around the state. He visits each of the ministry’s seven group homes four to six times a year, sometimes accompanied by his wife, Debbie. Most weeks, he also rotates between the ministry’s two inpatient facilities — the behavioral hospital in Maumelle and the Methodist Children’s Home campus. He doesn’t have a desk to call his own. Instead, his car is his office.
Craig Gammon, the administrator of Methodist Family Health’s children programs, said the ministry was looking for a chaplain who would connect with the kids and in Moore, “we overachieved.”
Most of the ministry’s young clients have experienced abuse or neglect, and the Arkansas Department of Human Services has referred them for care.
Many are angry with God. They ask questions like, “Why did this happen to me?”
“Pastor Scott does a very good job of sitting down and being very positive with them,” Gammon said. “He shows them their value — their worth — to themselves, to their families and to God.”
‘Perfect ministry’
When youngsters first arrive in one of the ministry’s treatment programs, they usually aren’t happy to be there.
“There are many kids who won’t talk to me for the first month except to say ‘hi’ — and they are required to do that,” Moore said. “But after a month or so, they might ask ‘Can I talk to you?’ I’m just waiting because I’ve learned that if I try to push myself on them, they’ll just put that wall up.”Moore, 52, learned his patience from years of volunteering with teens. An ordained deacon, he has worked with youth ministries in some capacity for 29 years and has a master’s degree in religious education from Southern Methodist University’s Perkins School of Theology in Dallas.
He also is a psychiatric nurse, who served for a few years at the Veterans Administration hospital in North Little Rock.
All that training and experience has culminated in his current post, which began in July 2008.
“I feel this is the perfect ministry for me,” he said.
Voluntary worship
As clients are told when they arrive, all of Methodist Family Health’s spiritual activities are completely voluntary.
“We’ll get kids who say, ‘I don’t believe in God,’” Moore said. “I’ll say, ‘Tell me what you do believe in.’”
Still most of the youngsters are eager to participate in the Bible studies and worship Moore organizes.
On a recent Sunday, dozens of children and adolescents filed into the Methodist Children’s Home gym to watch the drama team from Trinity Baptist Church in Searcy perform Christian-themed skits. Some of the kids brought along their own well-thumbed Bibles (Methodist Family Health has a fund to provide a Bible for any client that requests one).
At the end of the performance, Moore asked if any of the youngsters wanted to offer a closing prayer. Several hands shot up.
After the service, Moore mused that back when he led church youth groups, kids were rarely eager to pray in front of their peers.
He said the youth he now serves are not only more willing to show their faith; they are also hungry for stories of redemption.
“I have kids tell me, ‘I’m not going to ask God for forgiveness because God can’t possibly forgive me for what I’ve done,’” Moore said, his voice catching.
“I tell them that the God I worship is forgiving and loving beyond our comprehension. I tell them, ‘I don’t care what you do, God will always forgive you.’”
Therapeutic beat
That message helps kids to adjust their behavior in a positive direction, said Erik Narens, a program consultant for Methodist Family Health.
Narens said he’s seen Moore stay to listen to kid until 8 at night.
“We can tell them until we’re blue in the face why they should do something, but until they’re convinced, they are not going to make that decision,” Narens said. “And I think that he plays a big role in that.”
Rita Galloway, program administrator for Arkansas CARES, said Moore’s ministry also helps the women she counsels in their struggles with substance abuse.
One of his more innovative practices, Galloway said, is the drum circle.
Before the women arrive for a Friday morning spirituality session, Moore arranges chairs in a circle and puts a different percussion instrument on each one.
The women choose among djembes and bongos, maracas and rhythm sticks. Soon at Moore’s direction, they are beating out syncopated rhythms in unison.
“It teaches them to listen to each other and gets them in the rhythm of something bigger than they are,” Galloway said. “Our ladies love it.”
Lana Greer, one of the clients, said she can’t wait until Friday when she knows a drum circle is planned.
“I like the way it lets you express yourself,” she said. “I can’t really explain it. It’s just a good feeling.”
Merry Christmas
Come Christmas day, Moore expects to be with the children at Methodist Behavioral Hospital who either aren’t ready to go home or have no home to return to.
But he hopes to make the celebration of Christ’s Nativity as bright as possible for the youngsters.
The kids at Methodist Family Health all have a variety of experiences. But one thing they all understand, Moore said, is love.
“Everyone has experienced love at some level,” he said. “They understand that there are people here who care about them. “
