What is a Healthy Healing Hub? 
Vocation, Leadership and being a Healing Presence
We are living in unsettled days. Sometimes it feels as though each hour brings another “breaking news” alert: escalating conflict in the Middle East, deepening political fracture, economic instability, institutional strain. Even at a geographical distance, we feel the tremors.
The question many leaders are quietly asking is this:
How do I remain steady when the wider system feels increasingly unstable?
At GoHealth, we speak often about vocation, our call to be healing presences in the world. In anxious times, that calling becomes both more demanding and more necessary.
And at the heart of that calling is one word: belonging.
Belonging Is Biological
Why is belonging so essential?
Because loneliness kills.
That is not rhetoric; it is epidemiology. Large-scale studies led by Julianne Holt-Lunstad et al demonstrate that chronic social isolation significantly increases mortality risk comparable to smoking heavily. Loneliness raises the risk of cardiovascular disease, stroke, dementia, depression, and immune dysfunction. It elevates cortisol, disrupts sleep, and increases systemic inflammation.
The body reads prolonged disconnection as threat.
Belonging, therefore, is not sentimental. It is biological. The nervous system regulates in relationship. We calm one another through tone of voice, steady presence, shared attention, and touch. To belong is to become safer in one’s own body.
For leaders, this is not peripheral knowledge. It is foundational.
Belonging Is Formative
Belonging does more than protect us physiologically. It shapes identity, meaning, and moral imagination.
In Who Do We Choose To Be?, Margaret Wheatley argues that we are living through civilisational unraveling: ecological strain, institutional fragility, political polarisation, erosion of trust. Complex systems in decline do not reform neatly; they fragment.
Her question is not, “How do we fix everything?” but, “Who will we choose to be?”
Wheatley speaks of creating “islands of sanity”, relational spaces where integrity, calm, and compassion are preserved even when the wider system is chaotic. These are not escapist enclaves. They are stabilising presences. They endure. And by enduring, they influence.
This reframes leadership. The task is not omnipotence. It is formation.
It also reframes vocation.
Vocation: Calling as Identity
Vocation is not first a job description. It is calling. And calling is about who we are before it is about what we do.
To speak of vocation is to speak of identity rooted in belonging: belonging to God, to community, and to a purpose larger than personal ambition. When we discover our vocation, we are not inventing ourselves; we are responding to an invitation woven into our very being.
And when we practise that calling, we flourish.
Flourishing does not mean ease. Many vocations are costly. Some require us to stand in places of pain, conflict, or uncertainty. Yet even difficult callings generate coherence. They align our gifts, convictions, and commitments. They create meaning that sustains resilience.
In my recent conversation with Archbishop of Canterbury on the GoHealth podcast, we explored precisely this dynamic: how vocation calls us into demanding spaces — and yet becomes the very ground of spiritual vitality. Leadership at that level is rarely comfortable. But when rooted in calling, it becomes generative rather than depleting.
From that conversation, we have created a free GoHealth course with the Archbishop, designed to help you reflect deeply on your own calling and leadership in anxious times.
This is not a surface-level resource. It is a rare opportunity to engage directly with the Archbishop’s wisdom on vocation, spiritual resilience, and courageous leadership — at no cost, and at your own pace.
If you are discerning your next step, leading under pressure, or seeking clarity about your deeper purpose, this course is for you.
Access the free course with the Archbishop of Canterbury
Access the free course here and begin exploring your calling anew.
Belonging Requires Courage
Christian theology does not find this emphasis on belonging surprising.
Our faith begins not with isolation but with communion: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. To be made in the image of God is to be made for relationship. Belonging is not optional to human life; it is constitutive of it.
The question is not whether we belong, but how.
In fractious times, belonging requires courage. It is easy to polarise. Easier still to retreat. Harder to remain connected without collapsing into reactivity.
Here A Failure of Nerve by Edwin Friedman is instructive. Friedman argues that leadership failure is rarely about strategy; it is about emotional process. Organisations function as emotional systems. Anxiety spreads. Reactivity escalates. Leaders who absorb and amplify that anxiety destabilise the whole.
His answer is self-differentiation: the capacity to remain internally anchored while staying connected: separate but related.
A differentiated leader:
Remains calm amid reactivity
Takes principled stands without capitulating to fear
Maintains clarity of purpose
Stays present without being engulfed
This is not detachment. It is disciplined belonging.
By regulating themselves, such leaders help regulate the system. They strengthen community precisely because they do not fuse with its anxiety.
Regenerative Leadership in an Anxious World
In a recent GoHealth podcast conversation on regenerative leadership, Wendy Ball and I explored a related theme: leadership must not simply galvanise the energy of people and systems, but renew them.
Regenerative leadership recognises limits. It honours ecosystems; it prioritises long-term flourishing over short-term reactivity. It understands that sustainable impact arises from rootedness, not frenzy.
When leaders are clear about their calling and anchored in community, they lead in ways that restore rather than exhaust. They cultivate environments where others can also discern and live their vocation.
In this way, belonging becomes missional. It is not only about internal cohesion; it is about outward healing.
Join the Conversation
If these themes resonate, vocation, belonging, courage, regenerative leadership, we invite you to go deeper and join us live for:
“In the Room – Regenerative Leadership: A Live Session with Wendy Ball and Gillian Straine.”
This is a free, interactive session — not a webinar to watch passively, but a space to think together. We will explore:
How to remain steady in anxious systems
How belonging shapes resilient leadership
What regenerative leadership looks like in practice
How to cultivate “islands of sanity” in your own context
‘In The Room’ – Join a live conversation with Wendy Ball and Gillian Straine
If you are leading in church, healthcare, education, business, or community life — this conversation is for you.
Because in unsettled days, leadership is not about having all the answers. It is about choosing who we will be, and becoming healing presences, together.
What’s next….?
In the Room – Regenerative Leadership
“In the Room” is our free open conversation series — a space where anyone can join, listen, question, and contribute. Whether you’ve engaged with our courses, listened to the podcast, or are simply curious about a topic, you are welcome.
In this session, Wendy Ball and Gillian Straine return to their recent GoHealth Podcast conversation on regenerative leadership and open it up to you.
Click here
What is the Guild of Health & St Raphael?
Our vision
To see and be flourishing communities made up of flourishing individuals
The Church is at the heart of our vision. We want churches to be resourced and inspired to help individuals and communities flourish through worship, radical love and inclusion, serving those in pain, and demanding justice and peace. It is God who enables this work – we are called and invited to join in.
Our purpose
To equip and inspire people to nurture health and healing in ourselves, our communities and our world
Our work is empowered by God and founded on the command of Jesus to his disciples to heal, recognising that healing has always been at the heart of God’s relationship with creation. We weave together the threads of faith, community and modern medicine (with its deep roots in Christian theology) to activate people to be confident in a holistic approach to health.
Your work has opened my eyes to the fact that healing is part of the Church’s core business!.
Gerda
How you can get involved
The Everyday Healing Course is the best way to get involved in our vision and purpose because we believe that we are all called to be a person of healing in the world in the name of Jesus Christ. The course will allow you to explore in depth our approach to health and healing in the Christian faith and find the confidence and community you need to express your vocation today. It is the entry point for the Healthy Healing Hub Network, and strongly encouraged for the GoHealth Community members.
The Everyday Healing Course 2026 dates
We are booking well in advance so secure your place now!
We have thoroughly enjoyed the rollercoaster of the past four weeks. So many moments of wow, sadness, thought provoking, daunting, inspiring and we both agreed last night when it finished, that we were sad that it was the last one. So from the bottom of my heart thank you. It has been a privilege to spend this short time with you.
Trevor, West Yorkshire
The GoHealth Community
This community is at the heart of our vision and purpose. It is where those who are curious about faith and health gather, including the leaders of our Healthy Healing Hubs.
The community exists to resource and inspire us in our own health journeys and enable us to bring healing to others. Join for full access to the site, including resources, courses, and events, to connect with others and to join in with our vision.
The Chrism Journal
To deliver our purpose and vision, we engage with science, the world and our communities. We take time to learn from the experts – facilitate cross sector and inter disciplinary dialogue, in order to curate, shape content.
Together we coproduce a range of resources, including academic articles. To read any articles on line join The GoHealth community. To receive a hardcopy subscribe here.
The Healthy Healing Hubs Network
The Healthy Healing Hub Network inspires church leaders and their congregation to rediscover the connections between health and mission and be confident about delivering it in the complexities of the world.
Churches are places where people want to find healing and where members want to be equipped to take this message into places of suffering – we offer the training, support and resources needed to deliver this and grow the church.
Opportunities to learn, reflect and connect…
Want to know more about our work?
We’d love to tell you more about our work – just click on the links here which go into greater details about our calling and mission. They help us to show up to the work and to ourselves in a way that expresses the love of God and the hope of the Christian faith to make the world a better place.