When I’m visiting a different city and taking a taxi, I make it a habit to get the driver’s view on how things are there; to find out what the issues are and what is being done right and what is being done wrong. Recently, I was in Leeds for the FaithAction and Race Equality Foundation event on Health & Housing, and I was treated to some words of wisdom from my taxi driver. In answer to my questions, he started bemoaning the lack of public toilets and how this affected the local economy – an interesting point and unusual point. However, soon he moved on to a cultural revelation. He was talking about the result of cuts and lack of coordinated planning, when he said:

“Of course a generation ago, we were more satisfied. We did not want or expect so much...”

We talked about home ownership and gadgets, the essential commodity of consumerism. I must confess that, under his withering analysis, I felt quite exposed and hastily hid behind my Kindle and laptop whilst wriggling uncomfortably in my new-‘ish’ suit.

Our grasping approach to life seems to be all around us; a visionless never-satisfied outlook.

Archbishop of York Dr Sentamu recently preached, “Ours is really the most self-regarding culture in many centuries. We make choices as individuals, we have rights as individuals. If it works for you, do it. If it no longer works for you, throw it away and go on to the next thing. Never was the human universe so large yet so small. Never was a culture so written in the first person singular. In the words of the late George Harrison, 'I, me, mine'."

Our disregard for the consequence of self-focused action was brought home to me when I received a text from my wife saying she had scraped the car on a car park entrance which she uses on a weekly basis. What had transpired was that those who had arrived before her had parked outside of the prescribed space, resulting in a domino effect with everyone parking awkwardly. Whilst everything looked more or less normal as she drove around the car park, she scraped the car.

What’s the point to this story? It’s just a small example of the lie which says, “If I do what feels good to me and don’t hurt anyone, there is no harm”. The problem is we are not unconnected. One lazy approach to how we ‘park’ our lives affects someone somewhere.

A former head of a NHS trust told me this week the greatest determiner of whether a patient was released or admitted to hospital was not how ill they were, but whether there was someone at home for them.

The extent of our community and corporateness will have a big effect on whether we can ride out this economic storm.

So there I was, at home, having a quick bite to eat before a colleague and I headed into town for a contract meeting. There was a knock at the door and in burst Harriet!

Harriet is in her late 20s and has not long had her first child. She was due for lunch with my wife, and as she bounded into the kitchen, I realised what she was carrying was not a small child, but a puppy. The baby was outside in a buggy, so how she had been able to carry the dog and wheel the buggy at the same time I don’t know. The puppy was put into my garden, at which point it became very excited at our guinea pig hutch, and I had to spring into action to find a temporary lead to tie the dog up with. In the midst of this excitement, Harriet told me the story of how she had rescued this puppy as it ran back and forth lost on a main road near our local park. All the other passers-by watched as this distressed dog ran about, with not a one willing to get involved… other than our Harriet.

What a pain! There was a puppy in my garden (which, of course, took this opportunity to relieve itself), I needed to catch a train, but most important of all, my daughter was due home from infant school in less than 2 hours! She adores dogs and would assume that Christmas had come early. However, as I left the house, having carefully secured the dog, I was not focused on the issue of the dog, but on Harriet! What a wonderful person. She was willing to get involved and attempt to fix a problem when no one else was - even if it did mean a small “deposit” on my lawn. Harriet is a health care professional and I know that if anyone is under her care, she will push through, not serving the system, but the person.

We need Harriets, people willing to go above and beyond. The new Secretary of State of Health Jeremy Hunt recognises this. One of his four priorities is to raise the standard of care. We recognised that we can have good treatment in the UK, but what seems to be lacking is the best care. Now, this cannot be achieved by systems and monitoring etc. Care comes from the person. You cannot show good care simply by going through the motions. So let’s hope there are many more Harriets in health and social care.

This week's guest blog is by Revd Paul Holley of the Anglican Health Network:

Having moved from place to place over the years, it is good sometimes to return to a town I once called home. I recently had the pleasure of walking through the doors of the parish church in which I was married, at which our children were baptised and which supported me as I explored my vocation to ordained ministry. It happened to be a very significant weekend for the parish. They were celebrating 20 years of their outreach ministry - a drop-in centre that reaches out to those whose lives are severely blighted by alcohol and substance abuse.

As I heard stories of how people had emerged from their addictions and had begun to get to grips with the underlying problems in their past, I was touched by the significance of this ministry. My friends from many years back had committed themselves and their church building to the most vulnerable members of society. As a result they witnessed the sort of healing amongst individuals who normally fall furthest through the net.

In particular, I was pleased to see that they were working with health authorities to address the physical symptoms of destructive lifestyles. Nurses from the local primary care trust are in church 4 days a week to address the health needs of clients, even as centre workers and volunteers are promoting growth in confidence and hope.

I have seen this sort of ministry also in the United States and in Canada. I am sure it goes on in many other parts of the Anglican Church and in other faiths. Parish churches are responding to needs and demands that are not easily addressed in formal health care settings. The level of trust, care and long term commitment creates a context where those with the deepest problems may discover a purpose for their lives. As those who carry a message of hope for the future, church members are able to point those in need towards a life with meaning.

The Anglican Health Network are hosting and event on ‘Faith in Health and Healing’ on 24^th and 25^th April 2013 in Birmingham.  For further information and for information on how to book, please click here

I must admit to getting a bit bored recently. Bored, that is, with last week’s focus on the topless picture of the Duchess of Cambridge and this week’s rolling story of MP Andrew Mitchell’s mouthing off at the police. Are we not in danger of focusing too much attention and expense (there are cries for inquiries left right and centre) on these things? I’m not saying they are trivial issues. It’s easy to sympathise with the Royal Family and to be concerned by the lack of respect attributed to the police. But, proportionately, this occupies too many column inches and too much TV reporting.

Parliament is in recess, so in theory there is less news to pursue. However, would this not be a great opportunity to focus on some good news stories? Our heads are turned by the media, who bear a large role in deciding what we see and hear. I remember that in the early 90’s much attention was being paid to the Maastricht Treaty, what constituted a sausage and how straight a cucumber should be, whilst very little was said about the horrific civil war in Sierra Leone. It turns out that a relatively brief involvement of British forces, in a form of modern-day ‘gun-boat diplomacy’, made a significant and swift change to the situation when Robin Cook’s ethical foreign policy took hold.

So while we are taken up with what a minister did or didn’t say to the police, what else are we missing? What is going on in Sudan or Zimbabwe, for example? How about the places where there is no oil or natural resources - the places where people cannot get attention?

This is where Faith plays such a key role; in so many areas, both in the UK and elsewhere, people of faith are the first in and the last out!

In this blog, Dr. Atul Shah, founder of Diverse Ethics, talks about mental health, and the role religion can play in preserving it.  For further information, please visit www.diverseethics.com.

RELIGION PRESERVES MENTAL HEALTH AND GIVES INNER STRENGTH AND DIGNITY

My father is 87 years old. Every morning he prays and meditates for three hours, without fail. He is disabled, can barely walk, but this is his ritual. It gives him peace, meaning and purpose, and I have noticed that his mind is very sharp all day, and he reads and reflects all the time.

This is not an isolated story. I know many Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims and Jains for whom faith is a core part of their life, and in retirement gives them strength, self-confidence and mental peace in spite of the most difficult of circumstances. When every day people head to work, I see many elderly people heading to their local temples, gurudwaras or mosques to get a sense of meaning and community and to pray and worship. This is a story we rarely read about in the newspapers or the media – it is a fact which saves the government a huge amount of money (millions of pounds), through savings in mental health and physical health bills, building harmonious families and sustaining communities. And most faith organisations are entirely self-funded by the communities and do not get a penny from the government. They are not scroungers or benefit cheats, but instead people and groups who add significantly to our health and well-being as a nation. Unfortunately, this story is rarely appreciated, understood or celebrated.

In 2010, I embarked on an Epic Masala Tour of Britain, to showcase the story of the Indian community in Britain and how it contributes to the country through its faith, ethics, food, creativity, culture and education. I filmed as I travelled to catalogue the personal stories of individuals and communities, and created a special You Tube channel for this. You can read about the tour here: http://www.diverseethics.com/masala/about-masala/mblog-6

And watch any of the 80 films on the You Tube channel here: http://www.youtube.com/MasalaTour

Through these stories, you will discover how faith influences and enriches society often in very subtle ways. Another great aspect of faith is festivals. And I have seen mental health being hugely boosted for many people during these experiences. In fact, festivals are like a mental health holiday, and recommended for everyone at least a few times in the year. I write just after the V music festival, and this also attracted thousands of people, but each had to purchase an expensive ticket, and the music brought everyone together. However, faith festivals go deeper and reach wider than this as they are bound by discipline, free to all and encourage people to seek purity and divinity, and avoid drink and drugs.

What modern scientists and journalists do not understand is the huge variety and depth of faith, and its long history, tradition and creative heritage. The UK government must publicly recognise the huge contribution of faith communities and educate policy makers and health practitioners to work with these communities to provide support and encouragement. Economists and social scientists need to measure the economic impact of faith communities and the huge benefits they generate for health and wellbeing.

I’m back in London after being away for much of the summer, one way or another. I ventured into town and, as I have to pass through Stratford, I enviably get immersed in Olympic traffic; conspicuous pink and maroon Olympic shirts everywhere.

There is still a bit of a buzz; directions to give, excited children to observe, and the sun is out; not the usual drudgery of commuting. (As I tend to wear a business suit, I often get asked for information, which is the same hazard as going to a local supermarket: everyone assumes you’re the manager!)

Just the other day, I aided a couple hopelessly overloaded with children and coffee cups as they cleaned a spillage on the train. (Come to think of it, when do people clean up on a train normally?). I offered help to someone unwell in the street, and dispensed tips on taking children to the Olympic park to a family as we shared a carriage. I'm not saying I’m special; I just think that I too am a Games Maker! (I quite fancy the outfit as well!)

Of course, many of us are wont to do these things in the normal run of life, but the Olympics seems to give us more permission. David Cameron could smugly conclude that Big Society is alive and well, if somewhat undercover. These spontaneous acts of kindness are, I think, a good measure of a better society. In fact, this observation forms a chapter in our booklet on faith and Big Society, ‘How to eat an elephant’.

So, maybe the legacy of the 2012 Games will be that the Tube travel is more humane?

In this blog, Kathy Coe of the Pathway Project asks if we are failing to address the issue of Domestic Abuse.  For further information on Pathway Project, please click here.