We Are A Ministry
Welcome to Avera
We are pleased to have you as a partner in our ministry. This is an introduction to elements important to Avera’s spirit of mission.
We Are a Ministry Video
Comments about Avera from partner physicians. View the video >>
Introduction - David Erickson, MD
Body, Mind and Spirit - Michael McVay, MD, Yankton Medical Clinic
Stewardship - Carilyn Van Kalsbeek, MD
Hospitality - Farid Kutayli, MD
Compassion - Addison Tolentino, MD
Partnership - Richard Kafka, MD
Mission Focus - David Balt, DO
Look no further - Tad Jacobs, DO
The Avera Mission
Avera is a health ministry rooted in the Gospel. Our mission is to make a positive impact in the lives and health of persons and communities by providing quality services guided by Christian values.
Key Points
• We use the word ministry deliberately; it means connectedness with Jesus’ work of healing.
• We fulfill our ministry by helping individuals and communities.
• We use the word mission to imply all the themes described here and more.
The Avera Vision
Working with its partners, Avera Health shall provide a quality, cost-effective health ministry which reflects Gospel values. We shall improve the health care of the people we serve through a regionally integrated network of persons and institutions.
Key Points
• Avera is and will be a trustworthy partner with others.
• Our goal is to improve the health of the people in our region; to accomplish that, quality is crucial, now and in the future.
• We are not simply a top-down, centralized ministry. We respect and balance both local and regional needs and commitments.
The Avera Values
Compassion
The compassion of Jesus, especially for the poor and the sick of body and spirit, shapes the manner in which Avera employees, physicians, administrators, volunteers and sponsors deliver health care. We express compassionate care through sensitive listening and responding, understanding, patience, support and healing touch.
Key Point
• The people who come to us, as patients or employees, rightfully expect to experience Christ-like understanding and compassion from all, including administrators and physicians.
Hospitality
Jesus’ encounters with individuals were typified by openness and mutuality. The Avera community expresses hospitality by means of a welcoming presence, attentiveness to needs and a gracious manner, seasoned with a sense of humor.
Key Point
• The people who come to us need to experience a warm, gracious welcome and the sense that their well-being is our central focus.
Stewardship
Threaded through the mission of Jesus was the restoration of all the world to right relationship with its Creator. In that same spirit and mission, the members of Avera treat persons, organizational power and earth’s resources with justice and responsibility. Respect, truth and integrity are foundational to right relations among those who serve and those who are served.
Key Point
• We have been given many gifts and resources, not to be used selfishly or carelessly, but wisely for our ministry.
Avera's Beliefs
From the earliest traditions of the Church to the present day, the mission of evangelization to which Jesus sent his followers has included healing as a major part. “Into whatever city you go, after they welcome you…cure the sick there. Say to them, ‘The kingdom of God is at hand.’” (Luke 10:8)
Members of the church follow the example of Jesus, therefore, when they carry out the work of healing — not only by providing care for the physically ill, but also by working to restore health and wholeness in all facets of the human person and the human community. Wholeness in the Christian perspective includes not only the physical and emotional, but also spiritual and social.
In this spirit Avera pursues a special vocation to share in carrying forth God’s life-giving and healing work. In addition, the persons and institutions allied together as Avera share these beliefs.
• God permeates all moments of human experience and is present to every person in health as well as sickness, in life as well as death.
• We support life from conception to death, believing that the journey of life, including the beginning and the end, are gifts of the Creator, entrusted to us for reverent care.
• The core values of compassion, hospitality and stewardship guide our caregivers and our service.
• Justice and mercy demand our advocacy for the poor, the frail and the at-risk persons of our society; all persons have a right to basic health care.
• Our management decisions and delivery of care are motivated by the health and wellness of patients, their families and communities.
• Our employees, physicians and community partners are our most valuable resources.
Avera believes that social and institutional wellness are best promoted through joined efforts of various religious and community-sponsored institutions. Choosing collaboration and empowerment enables us to be better stewards of our human, financial, technical and environmental resources. In accord with its Catholic mission, Avera adheres to the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services.
Key Points
• Avera’s call from God, our vocation, is to continue Jesus’ work of healing.
• Avera’s core beliefs impact our ministry.
• We are committed to working in partnership with others and upholding the Ethical and Religious Directives for Catholic Health Care Services.
Our Sponsors
The Benedictine Sisters of Yankton, S.D., and the Presentation Sisters of Aberdeen, S.D., sponsor Avera.
The Benedictine Sisters’ roots go back some 1,500 years to St. Benedict of Nursia who founded the Benedictine way of life, a form of monastic living based on his instructions entitled The Rule.
The Presentation Sisters go back some 250 years to Nano Nagle, the woman who founded their apostolic community. She schooled Catholic children and attended to the needs of the poor in the poverty stricken areas of Cork, Ireland.
The Benedictine and Presentation Sisters have lived and ministered for more than a century on the Northern Plains and have proud histories of providing compassionate, quality health care to people of our region.
Key Points
• Our sponsors are wonderful women, intelligent, dedicated and blessed with good humor. When opportunities arise to meet and get to know them, take advantage of it.
• We hope that over time, through contact with our Sisters, you will grow to appreciate them, their spirituality and the Source from which that spirituality comes.
Care for the Poor
Avera’s ministry calls us to care for the poor, frail and at-risk people of society. To be successful we need to stand with the poor, try to see the world the way poor people do and then adjust our actions accordingly. When we have meaningful contact with poor individuals or families, it will help us break through the often-hurtful myths and generalizations that surround them. Standing with the poor means asking ourselves in every aspect of our lives, “How will this affect the poor?” Personally, it needs to affect how we spend money on food, clothing and housing, and how we vote. Organizationally, it motivates us to ask, “How will our decisions affect the poor?”
Key Points
• Avera has an obligation to care for the poor.
• The more we relate to the poor, the better we will appreciate their situations.
• As individuals and as an organization, we need to ask ourselves what impact our decisions are having on the poor.
Concern for Social Justice
Social justice looks at the big picture of society. It strives to arrange society so that individuals can enjoy the basic rights that flow from their dignity as children of God. It specifies how the activities of individuals and groups are to be organized so that they converge to support the common good.
Social justice is based in the dignity and sacredness of persons; because of people’s dignity, we owe them whatever affirms, protects and enhances their worth as unique persons created in the image and likeness of God.
As a Christian-Catholic organization, we are concerned about social justice for two reasons:
• Human beings have inalienable rights that are deeper than and prior to any rights given to citizens by the state. When we care about our communities and neighbors, our care includes concern for their inalienable rights.
• Scripture tells us that God is clearly concerned for justice. We see this in the lives and words of the Old Testament prophets, as well as the life and words of Jesus. If God is concerned for justice, God wants us to be concerned as well.
Working for justice and helping to transform the world are essential aspects of preaching the Gospel and helping to redeem people from oppressive situations. If we want to continue Jesus’ healing mission of liberating people from pain and suffering, our mission will include working for justice.
Key Point
• Avera works with other parties to accomplish what is for the common good and to impact societal forces that keep people in painful life situations and at the margins of social life.