SPD Course Descriptions

Spirituality and Personal Development (2009-2010)

This course examines theories about the psychological nature of religious experience, the source of religious belief, and the religious significance of psychological phenomena. Attention will be given to the role of introspective, psychoanalytic, experimental, humanistic, and transpersonal methods in the psychology of religion.

This course studies the various "developmental tasks" of the human life cycle in order to discover what psychological and religious needs should be satisfied at each stage of a person's life. The course also seeks to develop students' awareness in order to sensitize them to the processes of their own growth and development.

A seminar for senior students in the SPD Minor who have taken the other core courses. The subject for study will be determined by the common interest of the students registered in the course.

The following existential issues related to the aging process are examined from the perspective of the psychology of religion: identity, belief, actualization, existential anxiety, conversion, individuation, and spirituality.

The course examines the spiritual dimension of the search for meaning, especially at crucial points in life, via the work of Viktor Frankl and the spiritual, philosophic, and psychotherapeutic dynamics he introduced.

Jung's analysis of the development of the personality through its life cycle, and of the central place which religion holds within the process of maturation. This includes a study of the unconscious, the collective unconscious, dreams, myths, symbols and archetypes; and the implications of Jung's theories for religious thought and therapy.