Chaplain Peter Eason (left) has been hired as the Saskatchewan RCMP's first employed chaplain. (Submitted photo/Meadow Lake RCMP Commander Ryan How)

By Elliott Knopp

Chaplain Eason

Saskatchewan RCMP hires Meadow Lake’s Peter Eason as first provincially-employed police chaplain

Aug 9, 2021 | 4:11 PM

In looking to fill the need for more community and police support outside of an enforcement role, the Saskatchewan RCMP announced the hiring of a Meadow Lake man to provide a helping hand to those in need within the RCMP’s F division.

Chaplain Peter Eason becomes the first chaplain hired by the Saskatchewan RCMP. While chaplains had been previously assisting with operations for years, they had served their respective communities on a volunteer basis.

In this role, Eason will continue serving officers in the community through offering emotional, spiritual and mental health support, as well as by acting as a figurative bridge-builder between the public and the RCMP. In Critical Incident Stress Management (CISM) situations, he may act as a figure to de-escalate the situation, host team unit resilience workshops or critical incident stress debriefing.

Chaplain Tom McCullagh, who also works as a CISM coordinator for the RCMP’s F division, has worked alongside Eason for the last 13 years. He stated hiring Eason for this role will help further provide communities with much-needed resources and assistance that will allow members of the force to better serve their communities.

“He’s meeting a huge resource need in our province. It’s pretty hard sometimes for me to get all over the province in a timely fashion, and I also serve on other teams,” McCullagh explained.

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“Sometimes, they just can’t get out, so he and the other volunteer chaplains — we’ve got about 25 in the province — just help to be boots on the ground and local resources to our members and employees. He really helps to augment my position, and just helps to fulfill a lot of gaps that sometimes I can’t reach simply because of distance.”

Eason has served in this role as a volunteer since 2009. He also served as an officer with the Salvation Army starting in 1986 before retiring in 2019. In McCullagh’s address during a celebration honouring Eason’s hiring with the RCMP, McCullagh mentioned Eason’s time with the Salvation Army has seen Eason operate in several cities, including Whitehorse, Yellowknife and two stints in Meadow Lake.

During his time as a volunteer chaplain, Eason frequently visited several communities in Northern Saskatchewan, including Green Lake, Beauval, Pierceland and Loon Lake. McCullagh said Eason is expected to expand his services even further, making contact in areas like Buffalo Narrows, Île-à-la-Crosse and others.

“Peter’s built credibility with our members in the North. He has the respect of the members, he’s got the trust of the members, and now by being paid, he has more of an ability to be available to the members and broaden his area of service,” McCullagh shared.

“He becomes a primary care person for members. Pete’s been trained in critical care, trauma care, relational counseling and marital counseling. So it’s an incredible boot on the ground for Northern members, especially when access to resources are often limited, whether it be psychological resources or counseling in that sense. He can be right there, he knows the members, and he can provide that resource as a counsellor.”

Eason said while he has served as a chaplain for the RCMP on a volunteer basis over the last 13 years, he is ‘honoured and grateful’, for the privilege to continue serving the community in a more official capacity.

“The RCMP have thankfully recognized the need for increased support for our members in numerous areas, and one of the ways is certainly with chaplaincy and mental health. It’s terrific… I’ve been able to serve our members who do so much for the community and others. Chaplaincy has been a real priority for me for a long time.”

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elliott.knopp@pattisonmedia.com

On Twitter: @ElliottKnopp