Towards a theory of communion‐in‐caring

Abstract

When nursing practice assumes a fix-it view model, it limits the growing capacity of practice. The theory of communion-in-caring emerged as a hopeful response to the call to offer a new vista. This theory unifies caring and the endless potential of human care. The aim of the paper is to describe the theory of communion-in-caring grounded in the human science philosophical perspective. Generated from a focused review of scholarly literature from classical caring theories in nursing to contemporary theoretical viewpoints in nursing published within the last decade guided by a creative theory-building process. This paper presents the theory of communion-in-caring with theoretical concepts and theoretical assumptions illuminating and supporting the contextual design and epistemological viewpoints of a caring-based theory of nursing. Communion-in-caring is defined as a deliberate and a momentary occurrence of a nursing-caring encounter in which the nurse and person nursed, together, design and express unique practice processes toward affirming and celebrating being human in a unitary-transformative world. The theory further illuminates the foundational acts (i.e. love, hope, faith and charity) emulated into the embodied processes of communion-in-caring (i.e., caring-nurturing encounter, caring-nurturing inquiry and caring-nurturing capacity). Such cyclical, rhythmical and moving processes yield a nurtured caring environment with ethical standpoints, resonate the meaning-essence of caring through participation-in-being and offer culturally congruent care. This theory also realises that the discipline is overly influenced by technological advancements, digitalisation of care, the medicalisation of practice and a mechanistic lens of care. Thus, this theory calls for moral enrichment towards an identity that embodies participation-in-being, seeing self-in-others and communion-of-being.