An update from Rev John Rich, RN:
Just a couple of months ago, in January 2025, the Sozo Health Ministry celebrated ten years of service to the community. A full decade?! How can that be?
Like many things, the Sozo Health Ministry began long before the official “first day” that we started seeing and serving clients. I trace the origins back to at least 2007. At that time, Amy and I were not yet Co-Executive Directors of Patchwork Central. We didn’t even live in Evansville. We were living in Cincinnati, Ohio and I was pastoring a wonderful little congregation in Northern Kentucky.
In the Spring of 2007, I happened to be making more hospital visits than usual for sick congregants. I observed the hospital nurses performing amazing feats of healing in holistic ways—physical, mental, emotional, social, and spiritual. At the same time, I also happened to be preaching a sermon series on healing stories in the New Testament. As these two situations developed concurrently, I started feeling a spiritual call to get trained and licensed as a Registered Nurse and to combine healthcare with my pastoral ministry somehow.
A few months later, Amy and I learned of the Executive Director opening at Patchwork Central and decided to apply as Co-Executive Directors. We moved (back) to Evansville in the Summer of 2008 to serve in that capacity. That Fall, I started taking prerequisite courses for the University of Southern Indiana Nursing program.
Fast forward to 2014. I graduated from nursing school and obtained my nursing license in 2012. I had been working at a local hospital ever since, honing my nursing skills … and paying back my student loans! I had been talking with Patchwork’s Neighborhood Hospitality guests for a few years, listening to their stories and trying to understand what they might need from a “health ministry.”
Brainstorming, conversations, online courses, meetings with community healthcare leaders, sleepless nights, false starts, research, sitting and thinking, doubting myself and my calling, getting back to work—it took a long time and a LOT of collaborators (my apologies—there are too many to name them all here) to come up with a solid proposal for a new “Health Ministry” program. The Patchwork Central Board of Directors officially approved the creation of the Sozo Health Ministry in September of 2014, with a planned starting date of January 2015.
This is just a brief “pre-history” of the Sozo Health Ministry. In the past ten years, I believe that we have contributed significantly to the health and holistic well-being of our neighbors and the community as a whole. Some of the aspects we originally envisioned have not come to pass … yet. Many aspects of the health ministry evolved as we talked with our guests about their needs. For instance, at the beginning we never would have thought of providing soothing foot-soaks to some of our guests who walk everywhere all day long.
As I reflect on the first decade of the Sozo Health Ministry at Patchwork Central, I remember blood, sweat, and tears—all of them quite literally. Most of all though, I feel gratitude, immense gratitude for the ability to follow my calling and for that calling to meet the needs of so many, to help guide and empower them on their healing journey. My heart is full as I offer sincere thanks to everyone who has supported the Sozo Health Ministry in any way over the last ten years: financial contributions, volunteering, donating health supplies, praying/sending healing thoughts, and all of the other ways you have provided for the health and healing of our community. Thank you.
I want to say a special “Thank you!” to Mary Damm, a stalwart nurse volunteer who has been with Sozo almost since the beginning. She is a huge part of what the Sozo Health Ministry is today. Another pair of special “Thank you’s” to the two Associate Health Ministers we’ve had—Katie Loehrlein and Jill Miller. Each brought their own unique skills and talents to the Sozo Health Ministry and expanded it into territory I never imagined when I first started it. Thank you both!