MA in Spiritual Care

First Year, Fall

All courses begin in a nine-day retreat intensive setting just before the start of the semester.

REL-600E Meditation Practicum I: Seeds of Peace (3)

Students are introduced to sitting meditation practice, drawn from the Tibetan Buddhist tradition of shamatha-vipashyana. Weekly lectures emphasize experiential aspects of the practice, involving such topics as the discovery of impermanence, working with emotions, and the cultivation of maitri (loving-kindness). This course includes weekly discussion groups, individual meetings with a meditation instructor, and daily meditation practice. MA and MDiv.

REL-602E Contemplative Communication in Spiritual Caregiving (3)

This course examines human communication as the foundation for relational and ethical practice in the field of spiritual care. Insights from phenomenology, linguistics, philosophy of communication, and Buddhist contemplative practice will address and deconstruct theories of communication that emphasize separateness and the priority of speaking over listening. Through practicing mindful communication and examining communication biases, students will develop foundational contemplative skills and attitudes that contribute to the spiritual health and wellbeing of persons in crisis. Course themes will include listening as empowerment, listening and responding as an ethical responsibility, and “listening the other into being” as an act of love.

REL-616E Integration Lab I (1)

The first in a series of small groups in which students participate throughout their degree program. Emphasis is on providing a reflective container to integrate lived experience, classroom learning, contemplative practice, and exploration of one’s professional journey. Through group process, individual reflection, mentoring, and community engagement, the lab facilitates the integration of personal, communal, and theoretical domains of learning in order to support students in vocational discernment and professional development in religious studies and/or spiritual leadership.

Elective (3)

Subtotal: 10 credits

First Year, Spring

All courses begin in a nine-day retreat intensive setting just before the start of the semester.

REL-615E Power, Privilege, and Diversity (3)

An examination of the nature of the human group-field. Of particular concern is how human groups create both helpful and harmful conditions in the world. This class provides the theoretical underpinnings of the group-field, including living systems theory, group dynamics, liberation theory, conflict theory, and healthy communication models such as mediation and nonviolent communication. Woven throughout is a focus on the dynamics of privilege, power, and diversity, and group-field process work as a way to engage group life.

REL-620E Meditation Practicum II: Self and No-Self (3)

Selflessness is considered a profound and difficult teaching. The subject is first approached indirectly by exploring the deeply conceptualized nature of human experience. This leads to identifying our experience of having a self and analyzing this self using analytical meditation. Does it exist or is it just an emotionalized fabrication? Based on the Theravada and Tibetan Shedra traditions. Prerequisite: REL-600/600E or permission of instructor.

REL-779E Interspiritual Dialog (3)

This course explores the increasingly nuanced terrain of religious and spiritual identity, especially as expressed in ‘hybridized’ forms of practice in and learning from the world’s spiritual traditions. It also introduces the student to the creative potential of interspiritual dialogue for expanding one’s personal theology and communicating effectively and compassionately across the religious spectrum. Through lecture and supervised practical exercises and application, students will develop a deeper understanding of their own religious identities, a deeper appreciation of dialogue, and learn essential skills for dialoguing around religion and spiritual traditions. This is “An Interspiritual Wisdom Course” specifically introducing students to diverse perspectives from the world’s wisdom traditions, as well as offering access to experienced teachers of those traditions in the classroom, either through video or in-person.

REL-654E Integration Lab II (1)

A continuation of REL616E. Prerequisite: REL-616E.

Subtotal: 10 credits

First Year, Summer

REL-658E Ritual Arts (3)

This course examines working with the collective community field through ritual, the art of understanding and embodying the sacred through activities of body, speech, and mind. The course will study and present rituals such as weddings, funerals, blessings, and rites of passage in order to equip chaplains, ministers, and spiritual leaders to serve their constituencies. The course will train students to craft and lead ritual, discerning the needs of the community, the articulation of sacred space, as well as their own authentic voice.

Electives (6)

Subtotal: 9 credits

Second Year, Fall

Some courses include a nine-day retreat during the first few weeks of the semester.

REL-635E Meditation Practicum III: Mind-Training (3)

This course continues instruction in meditation practice, emphasizing Mahayana practice, including the generation of an enlightened attitude (bodhicitta), the practice of the perfections (paramitas), the training of the mind (Lojong), and the exchange of the self and other (tonglen). Based on the Indian and Tibetan traditions. 

REL-714E Introduction to Spiritual Care (3)

REL-728E Integration Lab III (0.5)

A continuation of REL-654E. Prerequisite: REL-654E.

REL-804E Ethics and Spiritual Caregiving (3)

This course explores the ethics of spiritual caregiving in diverse contexts within the field of professional spiritual care, with a particular focus on empowerment and change agency. Readings and discussions will engage current and abiding ethical considerations such as healthy professional boundaries, the role of chaplains in guiding and supporting ethical deliberation, and complex ethics dilemmas in healthcare such as physician assisted dying, resource allocation, and end-of-life decision-making. Students will examine the varieties of human suffering in light of ethical theories that speak to the role of the professional caregiver as a source of empowerment and healing.

Subtotal: 9.5 credits

Second Year, Spring

REL-747E Clinical Pastoral Education (6)

Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) is an interreligious, experiential method of learning that brings students into supervised encounters with persons in crisis. Through lectures, open group process, theological reflection, onsite clinical instruction, and individual supervision, students learn the techniques, skills and self-awareness needed for the competent practice of spiritual care. CPE invites student to grow in awareness of the ways that beliefs, values, family of origin dynamics, and major orienting life events present both resources and challenges to effectively supporting the spiritual health and well-being of others. CPE students are assigned to clinical or community site placements such as hospices, hospitals, religious communities, and non-profits for the duration of the course, where they serve as student chaplains. ACPE application and permission from the instructor is required.

REL-768E Integration Lab IV (0.5)

Religious Studies Elective (3) 

Subtotal: 9.5 credits

Total Credits: 48