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One Nursing World The Impact of the 2024 NCFI World Congress
Much like the Olympics, the Nurses Christian Fellowship International (NCFI) World Congress gathers every four years, bringing together like-minded people from around the world with the goal of fostering global unity. Instead of athletes, however, NCFI focuses on creating a community for those who are living and practicing both as nurses and as Christians (R1). This year, the congress also welcomed representatives from various global nursing organizations, including Nurses International.
Taking place in Spain’s renowned Costa Del Sol, over 300 nurses from 50 countries (R2) gathered in the city of Málaga for a time of celebration and fellowship. By creating a supportive and encouraging environment for the nurses in attendance, the NCFI organizers and president Dr. Anne Biro (R3) facilitated a supportive and encouraging environment where nurses, who are usually in the posture of pouring out, had the opportunity to be poured back into.
The theme of this year’s conference was “Strength and Courage to Care (R4).” There was a strong emphasis on promoting holistic healing and wellness in the lives of the nurses themselves, allowing each attendee not only to connect with the global community of fellow Christian nurses but also to reconnect with their own holistic selves. This is a key aspect of health that can often be forgotten in the life of a nurse.
Daily morning devotionals, exposition of scripture in relation to nursing care, panel discussions on self-care for healthcare workers, breakout sessions led by conference members focusing on strength, courage, and self-care, and shared community meals all contributed to creating an environment that was healing, refreshing, and life-giving to participants.
Healing was not the only benefit provided by this conference. There was also a distinct presence of hope. In nursing, where burnout and overwhelm can feel rampant, and where professionals must interact with the most difficult aspects of life — death, loss, and disease — day in and day out, it is easy to begin to feel hopeless. Caring for one’s own patients can feel daunting enough at the community level. Trying to care for the entire world and respond to all the pain and suffering that occurs globally feels impossible. This latter endeavor feels impossible because it is impossible. No single nurse can be all things to all people, which is where hopelessness can start to set in.
The hope that the NCFI World Congress provided demonstrates that while no one person can take on all the sorrows of the entire world, there are many individuals out there who are pouring out love and dedication to their own unique corners of the world. Whether it be one nurse at a time, or small pockets of nurses with a shared goal, little by little, care is being delivered into the world and hope and healing can be found. Person by person, suffering is being seen, hurts are being addressed, and healing is happening. Each nurse present at the 2024 World Congress is a living testament to that.
To give an analogy shared by another nurse, “When we look at a field of corn, we often think that we need to be the ones to water all of that corn, but really, we are just one raindrop, and it is God’s job to make sure that all the fields are watered. We just need to focus on the one job that He has given us (R5).” There is healing to be found in the realization that we are not individually responsible for addressing all the world’s hurts. We do what we can, and we pray from there. And when we feel at a loss, or like we are not doing enough, we can rest assured that there are other nurses out there in the world, doing all that they can as well.
The keynote speaker, Dr. Martha Fowler remarked in her address Nursing Ethics: Covenant, Character, and Relation, “Nursing itself is not a calling, the calling comes from within the individual not from the profession (R6).” Nursing itself is just a profession, but within that profession, as demonstrated by those in attendance at the NCFI World Congress, there are many nurses who have found true purpose in nursing and are, patient by patient, community by community, creating change.
Fowler went on to say, “There is a call within the calling, we share a certain call and then diversify (R7).” Just as there are distinct specialties within nursing, there are different callings within the profession as well. From bedside to public health to education, to legislation, no one type or area of nursing is better than another. Instead, as a community of nurses, we all need one another. Our individual work builds on each other’s work, and while the needs of the world are vast and seemingly insurmountable when each nurse finds their calling within the profession and answers it in a way that is unique to their skill set, their own community is changed, and further change snowballs from there.
As both an attendee and presenter at the 2024 NCFI World Congress, I had the privilege of experiencing the conference from multiple perspectives while representing Nurses International. I presented a session titled “Becoming a Nurse While Remaining a Human: A New Nurse’s Guide to Maintaining Their Own Holistic Health,” which was well-received by both experienced nurses and nursing students. During my presentation, I highlighted the work of Nurses International in supporting global nursing education. The opportunity to connect with nurses from around the world during communal meals and breakout sessions was invaluable, reinforcing the sense of global unity that the conference aimed to foster. Many attendees expressed interest in Nurses International’s mission, allowing for fruitful discussions about the organization’s important work in global health education.
Nursing is a powerful and indomitable community, but we are a community that needs one another. When one of us needs to rest, we can rest easily knowing that the others will keep going. When we need support, we know that we have others around us to lean on. The 2024 NCFI World Congress was a powerful illustration of just how beautiful and robust the global nursing family is. Strong apart, but even more powerful together.
Author: Tenley Force, RN, BSN
Tenley Force is a registered nurse from Southern California with a background in med-surg respiratory, disaster response, public health, and nursing education. She is a current fellow at Duke Divinity School in the Theology, Medicine, and Culture Initiative and a published author. Her book "New: Nursing and the Art of Being Human" (2023) aims to support new nurses in maintaining their sense of self during their first year of practice. Tenley is also a proud representative of Nurses International, an organization dedicated to global nursing education. She is passionate about equipping nurses with tools to maintain their holistic well-being in the midst of a demanding profession.
References
R1. Nurses Christian Fellowship International. (n.d.). Welcome to Nurses Christian Fellowship International. https://ncfi.org/
R2. Nurses Christian Fellowship International World Congress. (2024, June 27). Opening Ceremony [Conference session]. Málaga, Spain.
R3. Nurses Christian Fellowship International. (n.d.). About NCFI. https://ncfi.org/about-ncfi/
R4. Nurses Christian Fellowship International. (n.d.). NCFI World Congress 2024. https://ncfi.org/ncfi-world-congress-2024/
R5. Force, T. (2023). New: Nursing and the art of being human. Polyverse Publishing, p183.
R6. Fowler, M. (2024, June 27). Nursing ethics: Covenant, character, and relation [Keynote address]. Nurses Christian Fellowship International World Congress, Málaga, Spain.
R7. Fowler, M. (2024, June 27). Nursing ethics: Covenant, character, and relation [Keynote address]. Nurses Christian Fellowship International World Congress, Málaga, Spain.
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EIN: 46-4502500