Download Training in CSD Cohort II 2016-18

The Alcyon Center
PO Box 40 Seal Cove, Maine 04674
207-244-1060 [email protected] www.alcyoncenter.org
Training in Contemplative Spiritual Direction—Class II
Fall 2016 – Spring 2018
A two-year program with four residential intensives
and three distance learning modules
Introduction
Grounded in contemplative practices of silence and heart, and informed by ancient
traditions of 'spiritual companioning’ — we seek to bring spiritual direction out of the prayer
room and into the world.
With the unfolding of traumatic world events, we feel the growing need for contemplatively
grounded spiritual leaders. These times demand new language and forms to meet the
spiritual hunger of our times.
This Training in Contemplative Spiritual Direction is open to all called by the contemplative
way, particularly those seeking to work with young people, veterans, recovering addicts,
change-makers, and the dying.
Residential Site
The Alcyon Center is a small contemplative community offering programs, trainings and
inspirational retreats. Known for its hospitality and the beauty of its cove and trails, the
Center offers a unique setting for intensive study and deepening practice. Guests share
double rooms and participate in some of the daily tasks of community life.
Overview of Training
Spiritual direction is an ancient tradition of ‘companioning’ a person or group of people on
their spiritual journey. Students in our Training in Contemplative Spiritual Direction will
learn to develop the capacity to listen in order to help others discern and respond creatively
to the presence of the spirit. Hence our program does not so much train ‘directors’ but
rather ‘guides’ who help others listen inwardly to the ‘speaking silence’ of the world.
At the most basic level, we do this by entering silence and cultivating heart awareness. Heart
awareness, or presence, brings us into an intimate and receptive resonance with both the
natural world and other human beings. Fostering this ‘infinite intimacy’ lies at the heart of
healing the duality of our present world, in which we feel alienated from earth and from each
other. As such, it is eminently practical and can be applied to virtually any activity or
situation.
Training in Contemplative Spiritual Direction requires immersion in a matrix of spiritual
formation practices including contemplative exercises, inner work, and group and individual
spiritual direction. Our teaching modules complement the experiential work by focusing on
aspects of Christian contemplative tradition, Spiritual Psychology (as developed by Robert
and Cheryl Sardello) and sacred texts. Special attention will also be given to how to serve
specific populations including veterans, the incarcerated, people in recovery, and the dying.
Curriculum overview
Each residential intensive will include a balance of:
• practice (10-15 hours),
• teaching modules (10 hours) and
• group discussion (10 hours).
Ongoing practices introduced and deepened throughout the four semesters:
• Heart awareness, silence, empathy and listening in nature and with each other
• Foundations for Spiritual Life: contemplative prayer, sacred reading (lectio divina),
developing a ‘rhythm and rule for living’
• Group spiritual direction and dyad spiritual direction
• Journal entries and mandala work.
Major themes addressed in the teaching modules in an ongoing way are:
• Cosmologies of the past and emerging paradigms of the present
• The art and practice of spiritual direction, with emphasis on silence, listening and
discernment of the heart
• Exploring the distinction between spiritual direction and psychotherapy
• Ethics, pitfalls, and supervision
• A study of the themes of the inner life including: abyss, addiction, dark night of the
soul, death and dying, desire, fear, forgiveness, grief, resistance, and reverence.
Dates
The program consists of four residential modules starting on Wednesday evening 6 pm
through Sunday 1 pm:
• Nov 9-13, 2016
• May 17-21 and Oct 11-15, 2017
• April 11-15, 2018
and three distance learning modules between residencies.
Cost
The cost for the full program is $3880.
This includes tuition and supplemental reading packet ($2600) and double room and full
board (4 four-night residential intensives) at The Alcyon Center ($1280). Not covered in the
cost is your own ongoing spiritual direction, books and travel.
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There are a limited number of scholarships available for tuition and/or room and board. Please
write us with details of your situation.
Single room may be available for $320 surcharge.
Commuter students: please inquire about daytime meals and use fee ($500).
Payment options:
• Eight quarterly payments of $495 (total $3960) starting Nov 9, 2016
• Four payments at time of session $970 (total $3880)
• One payment, 10% reduction if paid in full by Feb 1, 2016, (total $3490)
Program Components
Application Process
An application is available online or paper version, and is due July 31, 2016. It includes:
• an application form (personal information)
• personal reflection essay
• reference form for two references
• a $50 non-refundable application fee (applied to tuition if accepted)
An informal in-person or phone interview will be the final step of the process, scheduled
after we receive your full application including references. After being accepted, a $500
deposit is required which is applied to the total cost in the payment plan you choose.
Students will then receive the detailed schedule of sessions and assignments.
Spiritual Direction
Students are expected to meet regularly with a spiritual director of their choice starting at
acceptance in the program unless you are already in direction. During the second year of the
program they will also be providing spiritual direction to at least two others on a regular
basis. And while it is the responsibility of the student to make these arrangements, faculty
may recommend directors or placement where spiritual direction can be offered.
Faculty Support
Each student will be assigned a faculty member for the duration of the program. Student and
faculty will correspond regularly to address special concerns and feedback as well as to help
guide the student’s research and evaluate their papers.
Distance Learning: Work, Papers and Assigned Readings
Papers/Projects: Three integrative papers are required, focused on a major theme of the
session.
Readings: These will follow an assigned schedule, with short reflection papers.
Spiritual Practice: Students will form and follow a ‘rhythm and rule for living’, which will be
reviewed at each session. A rule for living typically includes things like: daily time of silence,
reading of sacred texts, study, journaling, time in nature, service, work, play and rest.
Work with mentor (and possibly a cohort): on a monthly basis.
Core Faculty
Kathryn Booth, M Div Bangor Theological Seminary. Co-founder and Director of the
Alycon Center, a spiritual life retreat located on Mount Desert Island in Maine. Kathryn
lived for ten years in an intentional spiritual community in France; served two UCC parishes
with a focus on spiritual practice and community outreach; and is a graduate of the Shalem
Institute’s Clergy Spiritual Life and Leadership program. A longtime student of Robert and
Cheryl Sardello, she is a certified teacher of the School of Spiritual Psychology. Kathryn was
also adjunct faculty at Bangor Theological Seminary and is an associate of the Northeast
Guild for Spiritual Formation.
Joan Jordan Grant, M Div Andover-Newton Theological School. Co-founder and Director
of the Alcyon Center. Before co-founding the Alcyon Center, Joan served two United
Church of Christ parishes as Associate Pastor for Spiritual Formation. Her primary vocation
is Spiritual Direction, which she has practiced for the past 30 years. Joan is an associate of
the Northeast Guild for Spiritual Formation.
Piers Kaniuka, MTS Bangor Theological Seminary, MA Antioch New England University.
Chair, Department of Transpersonal Psychology, Burlington College. Piers comes to his
academic post after working many years in the field of chemical dependency treatment. He is
co-founder and former Program Director of the Plymouth House, a 12 Step retreat located
in Plymouth, New Hampshire. Piers has studied for several years with Robert and Cheryl
Sardello and is a certified teacher of the School of Spiritual Psychology.
Core Bibliography
Dougherty, Rose Mary
Gruwez, Christine
Sardello, Robert
Group Spiritual Direction: Community for Discernment
Walking with Your Time
Love and the Soul: Creating a Future for the Earth
Silence: The Mystery of Wholeness
Heartfulness (pending publication)
Supplementary Reading Packet
Participants will receive a packet with reprinted articles and excerpted including:
Fitzgerald, Constance
“Impasse and the Dark Night”
Greenspan, Myriam
“Healing through the Dark Emotions”
Jericho, Lynn
“I am a Human Being: an essay on the four aspects of
being human”
May, Gerry
“Don’t Be a Pest”
O’Reilly, Mary Rose
“Listening Like a Cow” and “Looking at the Moon”
Picard, Max
“On Silence” and “On Language”
General Bibliography for Training in Contemplative Spiritual Direction
Recommendations will be made for reading and book reviews. We will gladly include other books that you
find foundational. Thank you.
Principles and Practices of Spiritual Direction
Corcoran, Donald, Sister
Ball, Peter
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich.
Edwards, Tilden
Fryling, Alice
Direction
Guenther, Margaret
Kidd, Sue Monk
Lipson, Michael
May, Gerald
Merton, Thomas
Peterson, Eugene
Ruffing, Janet, R.S.M.
The Spiritual Guide: Midwife of the Higher Spiritual Self
Anglican Spiritual Direction
Spiritual Care
Spiritual Friend: Reclaiming the Gift of Spiritual Direction
Spiritual Director, Spiritual Companion
Seeking God Together: An Intro. to Group Spiritual
Holy Listening: The Art of Spiritual Direction
When the Heart Waits—Spiritual Direction for Life’s Sacred
Questions
Group Meditation
Care of Mind, Care of Spirit
The Dark Night of the Soul
Will and Spirit (Discernment: 287-293)
Spiritual Direction and Meditation
The Contemplative Pastor: Returning to the Art of Spiritual
Direction
Spiritual Direction: Beyond the Beginnings (esp. Ch. 6)
Contemplative Practices by Contemporary Authors
Baan, Bastiasn
Bourgeault, Cynthia
Chase, Steven
DeMello, Anthony
Finley, James
Foster, Richard
Holt, Bradley
Kabat-Zinn, Jon
Klocek, Dennis
Laird, Martin
Lane, Belden
Merton, Thomas
Old and New Mysteries
Ways into Christian Meditation
Center Prayer and Inner Awakening
The Wisdom Jesus
Nature as Spiritual Practice
Sadhana: A Way to God
The Contemplative Heart
Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth
Chapter 12: The Spiritual Director)
Thirsty for God: A Brief History of Christian Spirituality
Wherever You Go There You Are
The Seer’s Handbook: A Guide to Higher Perception
Into the Silent Land
The Solace of Fierce Landscapes
Contemplative Prayer
New Seeds of Contemplation
Dialogues with Silence
O’Donohue, John
Nouwen, Henri
Romera, Lisa
Rohr, Richard.
Silf, Margaret
Steiner, Rudolf, (ed Bamford)
Teasdale, Wayne
Thompson, Marjorie
Trungpa, Chogyam
Urieli, Baruch
Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom
The Way of the Heart
Developing the Self
Immortal Diamond
Inner Compass
Start Now! A book of soul and spiritual exercises
A Mystic Heart
Soul Feast
Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism
Learning to Experience the Etheric World: Empathy, the
After-Image and a New Social Ethic
Reimagining Culture and Contemplation: Contemporary Themes and Crises
Alexander, Bruce K.
Delio, Ilia
Freire, Paulo
Jensen, Derek
Johnston, William
Keating, Thomas
Kingsley, Peter
Levine, Stephen
Palmer, Parker
Rollins, Peter
Sardello, Robert
Tarnas, Richard
Tick, Edward
Welburn, Andrew
Whitaker, Robert
The Globalization of Addiction: A study in poverty of spirit
The Unbearable Wholeness of Being
Pedagogy of the Oppressed
The Culture of Make Believe
Arise, My Love: Mysticism for a new era
Open Heart, Open Mind
A Story Waiting to Pierce You
A Year to Live
A Hidden Wholeness: The journey toward an undivided life
The Courage to Teach: Guide for Reflection and Renewal
The Idolatry of God: Breaking Our Addiction to Certainty
and Satisfaction
Freeing the Soul from Fear
Facing the World with Soul
The Passion of the Western Mind
War and the Soul
The Mysteries: Rudolf Steiner’s writings on spiritual initiation
Anatomy of an Epidemic
Classics—Wisdom from the Tradition
Anonymous
Cloud of Unknowing
Desert Fathers and Mothers Sayings
Ignatius Loyola
Spiritual Exercises
John of the Cross
The Collected Works of John of the Cross: The Ascent of
Mount Carmel, The Dark Night, The Living Flame of Love
Theresa of Avila
Interior Castle
Underhill, Evelyn
Mysticism
Journals
Presence, Weavings, Journal of Pastoral Care, Contemplative
Review, Tricycle