WEATHER ALERT

Retired local spiritual care practitioner given award

Advertisement

Advertise with us

A retired Winnipeg spiritual care practitioner has received a national award for her decades of work on behalf of patients and for those who work in the field.

Read this article for free:


or

Already have an account? Log in here »

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Subscribe and receive a limited-edition Free Press branded hat or tote.

Digital Subscription

One year of digital access for only $205*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles

*First annual payment billed as $205.00 + GST for one year. This annual subscription will automatically renew at $233.00 + GST every 52 weeks (10% off the regular annual price of $259.35). Offer available to new and qualified returning subscribers only. Cancel any time.

To continue reading, please subscribe:

Add Free Press access to your Brandon Sun subscription for only an additional

$1 for the first 4 weeks*

  • Enjoy unlimited reading on winnipegfreepress.com
  • Read the E-Edition, our digital replica newspaper
  • Access News Break, our award-winning app
  • Play interactive puzzles
Start now

*Your next Brandon Sun subscription payment will increase by $1.00 and you will be charged $17.95 plus GST for four weeks. After four weeks, your payment will increase to $24.95 plus GST every four weeks.

A retired Winnipeg spiritual care practitioner has received a national award for her decades of work on behalf of patients and for those who work in the field.

Lynn Granke, 69, was recognized for her work as manager of spiritual care at Victoria Hospital and for her service to the Canadian Association for Spiritual Care. The award was given at the organization’s annual convention in Ottawa during the last week of April.

Granke was honoured with the Verda Rochon Award, with the association noting Granke’s “outstanding and distinguished contributions to the field of psychospiritual health.”

SUPPLIED
                                Lynn Granke (centre) receives her award from Jeff Chant, CEO of the Canadian Association for Spiritual Care (left), and board president Ajith Varghese.

SUPPLIED

Lynn Granke (centre) receives her award from Jeff Chant, CEO of the Canadian Association for Spiritual Care (left), and board president Ajith Varghese.

Granke retired in 2017 after 20 years at Victoria Hospital.

“She spearheaded a lot of significant changes in the association,” said Canadian Association for Spiritual Care board president Ajith Varghese.

This included mentoring and training spiritual care practitioners, advocating for better pay for people working in that field and promoting better access to spiritual care for patients in Manitoba hospitals.1

She did this “out of deep compassion and commitment to help people,” Varghese said, adding she was a gifted teacher “who led with courage and grace.”

Part of that was helping the association integrate the findings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, so that Indigenous people would have their spiritual needs met in the province’s hospitals.

Granke, who was surprised to receive the award, said it was an opportunity to shine light on spiritual care and psychospirituality, which sees psychology and spiritual life as interconnected.

“It’s about being open and listening for the sacred,” she said of her work with patients. “Other professions, such as social work and psychologists, typically don’t do that.”

People trained in psychospirituality are curious about the many different ways people search for meaning and purpose and their connection to God or something beyond themselves, Granke said.

“It’s about care for the whole person,” she said, adding that health care can sometimes end up focusing only on the body and mind and ignoring the spiritual dimension.

“We want to honour the whole person … if spirituality is important to them, if it’s why they live and breathe, why not want to know about it?” she asked.

“How ever people view spirituality, we want to use it to help them.”

faith@freepress.mb.ca

The Free Press is committed to covering faith in Manitoba through our Religion in the News project. This reporting continues because readers like you step forward to fund it.

Donate now to support our reporting on religion.

Your donation is eligible for a charitable tax receipt. BECOME A FAITH JOURNALISM SUPPORTER

John Longhurst

John Longhurst
Faith columnist & reporter

John Longhurst has been writing for Winnipeg's faith pages since 2003. He also writes for Religion News Service in the U.S., and blogs about the media, marketing and communications at Making the News.

Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.

Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.

Report Error Submit a Tip

The Free Press acknowledges the financial support it receives from members of the city’s faith community, which makes our coverage of religion possible.

More Stories

Puzzles Palace

1 minute read Monday, Jul. 27, 2026

To solve our puzzles, please subscribe with this special offer: |

Bluesman’s memoir focuses on life before music fame

Ben Sigurdson 6 minute read Preview

Bluesman’s memoir focuses on life before music fame

Ben Sigurdson 6 minute read Wednesday, Sep. 23, 2026

He was born Colin Munn in Regina in 1964, but he’s best known by the name given to him onstage by his late friend Stevie Ray Vaughan in Ann Arbor, Mich., 20-plus years later — Colin James.

Read
Wednesday, Sep. 23, 2026

Safety officers responded to three assaults in first 4 1/2 months at downtown Hydro HQ

Carol Sanders 5 minute read Preview

Safety officers responded to three assaults in first 4 1/2 months at downtown Hydro HQ

Carol Sanders 5 minute read Updated: Yesterday at 12:11 PM CDT

Manitoba Hydro Place beefed up its security after an employee was assaulted in the main-floor gallery while leaving work in January leading the Crown corporation to close the building to the public for several weeks while it hired and trained institutional safety officers.

Read
Updated: Yesterday at 12:11 PM CDT

Well-known Brandon-born rock drummer Sutherland dies at age 58

Rylee Gerrard 3 minute read Preview

Well-known Brandon-born rock drummer Sutherland dies at age 58

Rylee Gerrard 3 minute read Wednesday, Sep. 23, 2026

Chris (Suds) Sutherland, a Brandon-born drummer who was the driving force behind many top artists in the Canadian music industry, has died at 58.

Sutherland is widely praised throughout North America as a talented percussionist with an extensive discography.

He performed with such Canadian music legends as Kim Mitchell, Randy Bachman, Burton Cummings, Streetheart and others.

Sutherland brought presence and “plow” when he played, Tina Faye said about her husband.

Read
Wednesday, Sep. 23, 2026

U of W marks gallery’s anniversary with group alumni exhibition

Jen Zoratti 6 minute read Preview

U of W marks gallery’s anniversary with group alumni exhibition

Jen Zoratti 6 minute read 2:01 AM CDT

Lux et veritas floreant, or Let light and truth flourish, is the University of Winnipeg’s motto.

It’s also a fitting title — and guiding theme — for a group exhibition celebrating the 40th anniversary of Gallery 1C03, the university’s campus art gallery.

Curated by Gallery 1C03 director and curator Jennifer Gibson and independent curator Jenny Western — both university alumni themselves — Lux et Veritas Floreant features works by U of W alumni artists KC Adams, Dee Barsy, Scott Benesiinaabandan, Jaimie Isaac, Judah Iyunade, Kegan McFadden, Shivanya Ra, Paul Robles and Melanie Zurba.

There is also a film component. A 7 p.m. screening tonight at Dave Barber Cinematheque features 10 films by alumni artists, including Steve Bates, Ian Bawa, Mahlet Cuff, Christina Hajjar, Mike Maryniuk, Kevin Settee, Leslie Supnet and Ted Turner. Isaac and Iyunade also have films in the program.

Read
2:01 AM CDT

Baruchel soulful in role as frustrated Canuck daredevil

Randall King 4 minute read Preview

Baruchel soulful in role as frustrated Canuck daredevil

Randall King 4 minute read 2:00 AM CDT

For better and worse, the name of the barely famous Canadian stunt driver Ken Carter (a.k.a. The Mad Canadian) will always be associated with the name of his much more famous American counterpart Evel Knievel.

Both men made their livings cheating death, jumping vehicles over a series of ever-more-daunting barriers, breaking records and bones in equal measure.

Carter’s career was, well, just more Canadian, which is to say obscure. After Knievel unsuccessfully tried to fly a motorcycle over Snake River Canyon in Idaho, Carter got the notion of flying a Lincoln Continental a whole mile over a stretch of the St. Lawrence River as the ultimate challenge of his career.

What followed was not so much a test of courage but endurance, as Carter kept cancelling the jump over a period of years, determined to do it without killing himself in the process.

Read
2:00 AM CDT