Background: The EAPC White Paper addresses the issue of spiritual care education for all palliative care professionals. It is to guide health care professionals involved in teaching or training of palliative care and spiritual care; stakeholders, leaders and decision makers responsible for training and education; as well as national and local curricula development groups. Methods: Early in 2018, preliminary draft paper was written by members of the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) spiritual care reference group inviting comment on the four core elements of spiritual care education as outlined by Gamondi et al. (2013) in their paper on palliative care core competencies. The preliminary draft paper was circulated to experts from the EAPC spiritual care reference group for feedback. At the second stage feedback was incorporated into a second draft paper and experts and representatives of national palliative care organizations were invited to provide feedback and suggest revisions. The final version incorporated the subsequent criticism and as a result, the Gamondi framework was explored and critically revised leading to updated suggestions for spiritual care education in palliative care. Results: The EAPC white paper points out the importance of spiritual care as an integral part of palliative care and suggests incorporating it accordingly into educational activities and training models in palliative care. The revised spiritual care education competencies for all palliative care providers are accompanied by the best practice models and research evidence, at the same time being sensitive towards different development stages of the palliative care services across the European region. Conclusions: Better education can help the healthcare practitioner to avoid being distracted by their own fears, prejudices, and restraints and attend to the patient and his/her family. This EAPC white paper encourages and facilitates high quality, multidisciplinary , academically and financially accessible spiritual care education to all palliative care staff.

Creating opportunities for clergy and palliative care staff to meet and undertake shared training will enhance the quality and level of care for people dying at home who wish to receive spiritual support. Enabling clergy to develop links with local palliative care centres will enhance confidence for both clergy and staff.

Death Chat provides a forum in which discussion of dying and death for recognises that these are social events and reclaims them from being taboo, to being a normal part of life's experience.

This article illustrates ways in which individuals and families memorialise dead family and friends through writing. St Christopher's Hospice chapel contains a 'Tree of Life' onto which paper 'leaves', written by individuals or families, can be attached. Twelve months after a bereavement, a Thanksgiving and Memorial Service is held and families and individuals are invited to write on an A5 piece of paper (T&M slip) sentiments or thoughts pertinent to the deceased. Both sets of writing which were collected and analysed in this study indicate a process of memorialisation and remembrance which is personal and descriptive and yet, because of the ultimate placing of the writing, quasi public. Some choose to write extensive pieces while others short sentences, but there are common themes to them in both content and style. The results of the analysis indicate that this writing forms a memorialisation process which, whilst unique for the individuals or family concerned, are common to all whose writings. Further, the analysis of the results indicates that recent models of bereavement can be seen through written memorials.

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