Stories@DukeDivinity features the work of the Holy Friendship Collaborative — a consortium of churches and healthcare leaders responding to the opioid crisis in Southern Appalachia. TMC is working with the collaborative to “figure out innovative and theologically grounded programs and practices. The idea is to find local solutions rather than a generic, one-size-fits-all program. The collaborative is inviting individuals and churches to take part, and hopes to identify a cohort of eight to ten congregations willing to spend 18 months in theological discernment developing different ideas. ‘We want to develop a test garden or plot,” said Dr. Farr Curlin, Josiah C. Trent Professor of Medical Humanities and co-director of the Theology, Medicine, and Culture initiative. “We’ll see what grows in the soil, what flourishes, and we hope to learn from that lessons that can be taken up and disseminated.” Read the article.