When employees of UPMC Mercy gathered for a daylong seminar on the Catholic identity of their hospital Friday, the first stories they heard weren't about high profile issues such as abortion and euthanasia.

Phyllis Grasser, the vice president for mission effectiveness and spiritual care, read a letter from a prisoner expressing gratitude that the hospital staff had treated him with respect. A nurse in the audience said that being a Catholic hospital means that, "If you're a prisoner, I take care of you the same way I would take care of you if you were the bishop."

In 2007 Mercy Hospital, both the first and last Catholic hospital in the region, merged with secular UPMC under an agreement to maintain its Catholic ethics and ethos. It was the first such arrangement in the nation between a Catholic hospital and a secular health system, and has become a model for several others, said the Rev. Lawrence DiNardo, chief canon lawyer of the Diocese of Pittsburgh and diocesan liaison to Mercy.

"It has been working exceptionally well," Father DiNardo said.

One written agreement made in the merger was that Mercy would continue to provide free care to the poor. The percentage of free care has increased under UPMC, Father DiNardo said.

Late in the day two medical ethicists spoke on difficult issues, particularly regarding end-of-life care. But much of the workshop provided biblical, theological and historical context for understanding Catholic social teaching and the mission of UPMC Mercy.

Father DiNardo outlined how a Catholic hospital fits into the church structure and the extent and limits of a bishop's authority over it. But he emphasized that its Catholic identity isn't rooted in rules but in the call of Jesus.

"The patient we have in front of us isn't just a patient who has come here for some procedure, but a child of God entrusted to our hands to be cared for" physically and spiritually, he said. "In the day of final judgment we will be asked to render an account of how well we have done and how we have used our lives to minister to others."

Patients should be able to observe that the care they receive is rooted in faith, but the goal isn't to seek converts, he said.