Jesus said, ‘I came that all may have life,

and have it abundantly.’

This year, the National Health Service, marks 75 years since it was first established. It was started because the government at that time believed everyone should be able to get healthcare - no matter how much or little money they had.

Since earliest times, Christian doctors and nurses, inspired by the example and teaching of Jesus, have been at the forefront of efforts to alleviate human suffering, cure disease, and advance knowledge and understanding. It was Christians who began to change society's attitude towards the sick, disabled and dying. In AD 369, a man called Basil in Caesarea founded a 300-bed hospital. This was the first large-scale hospital for the seriously ill and disabled. It cared for victims of the plague and was the first of many built by the Church.

It was not until the 18th century that the Christian hospital movement re-emerged. It reminded Christians to remember the poor and needy in their midst. They came to understand afresh that bodies needed tending as much as ‘souls’. New institutions were built by devout Christians for the 'sick poor', supported mainly by voluntary contributions. And Christians were at the forefront of the dispensary movement (the prototype of general practice), providing medical care for the urban poor. Indeed, modern nursing owes much to Christian influences. For centuries the majority of nursing, like most medicine, was carried out by monastic orders in their own hospitals.

In many ways, the Christian faith and medicine are natural allies; medicine offers people unique opportunities to express their faith in practical caring for others, embodying the command of Christ: 'whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me'.

The Rev’d Dr Richard Hines

Rural Dean