Passions, Patterns & Self-Understanding

Description: This course builds on students’ understanding of the passions and their own understanding of how these show in their own life, how God responds to them, and how we respond to them as spiritual directors.

Outcomes: Having fully engaged with this class, students will be able to (1) discuss the role of the passions in spiritual formation, (2) apply the wisdom of the monastic tradition to movements of the passions, and (3) examine the passions in one’s own interior landscape.

Format: A self-paced “four-week” class consisting of 10- to 20-minute instructional videos, each paired with integrative-reflective writing assignments—including some practices and conversational assignments to be engaged with the student’s existing community relationships.

Supplementary reading: 

• Acklin, Thomas & Boniface Hicks, Spiritual Direction: A Guide to Sharing the Father’s Love, Emmaus Road, 2017, $28.95 ($18.95 Kindle), 44 pp. assigned

• Bondi, Roberta, To Love as God Loves, Fortress Press, 1987, $22.00 ($5.99 Kindle), 28 pp. assigned

• Various excerpts from Desert Fathers (provided), 5 pp. assigned