Congregations step up their mental health initiatives, creatively turning unused spaces into places of connection

This Sunday, May 18, Ebenezer United Church of Christ in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, will be joining United Church of Christ congregations nationwide as they observe Mental Health Sunday — a day set aside on the UCC calendar that brings the message to those suffering in the still-silencing stigma of mental illness that it’s okay not to be okay. (For Mental Health Sunday resources, visit the UCC Mental Health Network here.)

It won’t be the only mental health-centric service for Ebenezer. The church, which became Wisconsin’s first UCC WISE (Welcoming, Inclusive, Supportive, Engaged) congregation in 2021, holds three such services throughout the year, underscoring the ever-growing need for mental health education beyond the designated awareness month. May has been known as Mental Health Awareness Month since 1949.

“We’re committed and open to journeying with all people,” said the Rev. Lorri Steward, who credits the church’s “actively engaged” WISE team with creating the multiple mental health worship services.

The result? People are noticing — and responding.

“At one such service we had a visiting pastor and his wife. The wife shared afterward how she had never heard mental health lifted in a service. She found it powerful and healing,” said Steward.

In addition to worship services, Ebenezer has recently increased its mental health programming from quarterly events and educational seminars to monthly.

Like many pastors, Steward recognized the need to do more, observing how the uncertainty in the world is increasing anxiety among all age groups.

“There’s a growing sense of naming what we’re thinking — naming the hurt, naming the fear. We are all following the Risen Christ and, as such, our call is to reach out and build bridges,” Steward said, adding that when it comes to mental health, the ability to support one another is imperative.

“Support groups are a gift of the Spirit,” she said.

At Rocky Hill Congregational Church in Rocky Hill, Connecticut, this gift is being nurtured with the creation of a wellness room within their house of worship.

An underutilized room finds new life

Shortly after becoming a WISE congregation in October 2024, Rocky Hill Congregational, a suburb just outside of Hartford, took a room in the building known as “the parlor” and turned it into a Wellness Room.

“It was a lovely space that was being underutilized,” said Heather Wolfe-Taylor, a psychiatric nurse practitioner whose experience comes in handy for the newly formed WISE team. Wolfe-Taylor also serves as Rocky Hill’s moderator.

She explained that the genesis of the Wellness Room began when fellow WISE team member, Dr. Jim DeGiovanni, former head of psychology for the Institute of Living, which is part of Hartford Healthcare, mentioned he had seen a church with a wellness/meditation space. The team loved the idea and presented it to the congregation.

“It was enthusiastically received,” said Wolfe-Taylor.

Volunteers leapt into action, transforming the parlor with a fresh coat of paint and new furniture, including meditation benches. Aromatherapy diffusers and an Amazon Alexa to play contemplative music on demand were also added. Printed pamphlets on a variety of mental health topics will be available as well as the team continues to work on library resources for the room.

The Wellness Room welcomes not just those feeling anxious or depressed, but also hosts a monthly reading group. And later this month, a support group for parents and caregivers of children and teens struggling with mental health challenges will begin meeting there.

“Members of our faith formation team and our children’s minister have become certified peer support group leaders through NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness). The meetings, searchable on the NAMI website, will be biweekly and opened to all in the community,” said Wolfe-Taylor.

Rocky Hill’s WISE team also envisions future sound therapy sessions to be held in the Wellness Room.

“We are always looking for new and innovative ways to help others,” said DeGiovanni.

The timing was right

The decision to become a WISE congregation was one that just felt timely and relevant, said the Rev. David Figliuzzi, pastor of Rocky Hill, who shortly after coming to the church noticed a reoccurring theme among the folks he visited: That of grief.

“Grief is a constant in our lives. As I got to know the people in this community, I began noticing people were grieving, be it relationships or the loss of dreams. I thought if this was what was happening in Rocky Hill Congregational, then surely it is happening out in the greater community,” he said.

And while the congregation traditionally skews more on the side of older members who experience the mental health challenges of loneliness and isolation that can come with aging, Rocky Hill also has children and teens on the spectrum or who have experienced early childhood trauma.

“Another reason becoming a WISE congregation and creating the Wellness Room was right and relevant,” Figliuzzi said.

Talk is not cheap, but healing

In the heart of the Poconos near the Delaware Water Gap the congregation of Zion United Church of Christ, Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, has found a way to bring mental health awareness to its weekly coffee hour by creating an environment that fosters conversations.

With the return of talk therapy making the headlines, having fallen by the wayside in the 1990s when medication without therapy grew popular, the congregation is on the cutting edge of mental health initiatives — by simply sitting down and chatting as if in someone’s living room.

It’s the very vibe their new pastor, the Rev. Gary M. Barraco, wanted.

Ordained only two-and-a-half years ago, the 63-year-old has not only found his second act at Zion United, but he is also embracing it.

“I wanted to use my energy for the right things,” said Barraco.

Now just seven months now into his call — and just three months since officially becoming a WISE congregation in February — the pastor is seeing a revival. And it all began with a question he kept asking: How do we have fun?

Mental health takes centerstage

With the idea of turning coffee hour into a time of meaningful fellowship, Barraco set his sights on the stage in the church hall that was collecting cobwebs.

Much to the disappointment of the church’s kitchen saints who were hoping for that space to become a new kitchen, Barraco instead filled it with comfy chairs, lamps and a rug. He then added tables filled with board games and a coffee bar serving up cappuccinos for the adults and hot coco for the children. Finally, the pastor dug out the church’s old yearbooks, albums, church reports, and put them out to be read and shared.

The cost of the transformation from unused stage to inviting living space was nominal. Barraco found most of the items on Facebook marketplace.

While inexpensive to create, the new space has become priceless, the pastor says, as young and old now spend more time interacting.

“It has become the perfect setting for the seniors of the church to share their memories with the kids,” said Barraco. “It is in that space that conversations can happen. Seniors need that. The stage now feels like you are entering someone’s home.”

Such interaction is invaluable for seniors as studies reveal increase health risks due to isolation.

Sharing stories ease anxiety

The “living room” fellowship time will continue strong this summer as Barraco plans on replacing the hot drinks with lemonade accompanied with pretzels and popcorn.

“I was told that the church didn’t host coffee hour in the summer. That’s not going to happen. The point is to get us to gather, talking and engaging with one another,” said Barraco. “People need to be in community with one another. It goes back to our UCC roots that all may be one.”

And it is in the sharing of stories where healing begins as witnessed by NAMI’s choice of the 2025 Mental Health Awareness Month theme: “In Every Story, There’s Strength.”

Barraco hopes his church and the greater Stroudsburg community can indeed find strength and healing from an anxiety, he says, is “hanging over so many people.”

“I call this anxiety the new pandemic. It is the pandemic of oppression. We didn’t get more relief from one pandemic to another,” said Barraco. “Anything we can do to ease the mental health challenges people are facing matters and makes a difference.”

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