The Essex Faith Covenant is a shared set of principles that guide engagement between faith communities and public services.

Being signatories of the covenant means St Helena will pro-actively build relationships and trust between faith groups and public services; create opportunities to raise awareness and share learning and knowledge between different faith communities and within the public services; and seek opportunities to bring people together to serve the community, particularly the most disadvantaged.

Mark Jarman-Howe, chief executive of St Helena, said: 

"St Helena provides individual care and holistic support for people in north east Essex who are facing incurable illness and bereavement. Our support is available to local people of all faiths and no faith. 

“We welcome joining the Essex Faith Covenant as a sign of our commitment to cater for people's spiritual care needs as well as their social, emotional, and physical ones."

The Essex Faith Covenant principles are:

• Faith communities are free to practice their beliefs and religious observances, and to raise their voice in public debate and to be respected, within the framework of UK law
• Public services and faith-based social action should respect service users from all backgrounds, without discrimination
• The voice, participation and solutions that faith communities bring are important, and good engagement with the public services should enable them to be brought to bear for the benefit of the wider community