Course Catalogue 2024-2025

This course examines the social determinants of addiction and considers the past and current influences on addiction counselling and approaches to treatment. In doing so it expands the biopsychosocial perspective of the field of psychology and addiction to include spirituality and cultural sensitivity as important determinants in assessment and treatment choices. The course will introduce students to specific assessment, interviewing and treatment modalities that are used in addiction counselling. Students will gain an understanding of the experience of addiction and the importance of the motivation to change. Students will gain an overview of relapse prevention as well as crisis intervention and the contexts of therapy for addiction treatment. Students will practice motivational interviewing and gain a basic understanding of how Dialectic Behavior Therapy (DBT) is used in treatment programs in the greater Toronto area. Students will also wrestle with spiritual and theological understandings of addiction. This course has been designed for training professionals who will practice in institutional contexts (including addiction treatment centres, hospitals, hospices, schools, and prisons) and in congregational or social ministry contexts.

This course examines diverse models for assessing the acute and chronic distress that stems from the psychological, emotional, social, and/or spiritual dimensions of life. In this program, students are equipped to assess various forms of distress and to develop plans for providing therapy that are based on evidenced-based research and best practices. Students will explore theories in the field of assessment (spiritual assessment, psychological assessment, DSM-V, MMSE, and so forth) and they will engage in experiential learning opportunities (case studies, role plays, and so forth) that develop their assessment and care planning skills. This course has been designed for professionals who practice in institutional contexts (hospital, hospice, schools, prison, and so forth) and in congregational or social ministry contexts.

The cross-disciplinary (pastoral and theological) course will help students reflect deeply on pastoral practice through interdisciplinary engagement with emerging issues that challenge the practice of pastoral ministry in today’s world. Issues addressed would include the pervasive impact of climate change on physical and mental health, changing family structures, sexuality, and gender, economic privation, racism, and other systemic injustices that undermine the sense of hope in a better future posing immense challenges for the effective practice of pastoral ministry.

This course provides participants with an introduction to spiritually integrated cognitive-behavioural therapy. At the conclusion of this course, through lectures, discussions, in-vivo exercises, and graded submissions, students will have learned how to assess and treat various mental health pathologies by eliciting and changing clientsˇ automatic thoughts and negative schemas using evidence-based CBT interventions such as case conceptualizations, structuring and psychoeducation, thought records, core belief records, Socratic questioning, behavioural experiments, depression and anxiety inventories, activity scheduling, fear ladders, and graded exposures. Unlike a purely secular CBT approach that leaves no room for clientsˇ spiritual beliefs, this course will emphasize how CBT can be enhanced when understood through the lens of contemporary spiritual care best practices. Participants in this course will first become acquainted with how to understand spirituality and religion through a CBT lens, then learn and practice how to enhance the effectiveness of CBT by integrating a working knowledge of spiritual care issues with established CBT interventions to treat anxiety, depression, grief and loss, panic disorder, social phobias, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Special attention will also be paid to employing established CBT interventions to treat the significant rise and proliferation of viral pandemic-related anxiety and depression.

This course will examine professional ethics in the helping professions (esp. spiritual care, psycho-spiritual therapy and social service) in order to further equip students for competence in their chosen field. We will consider the philosophical/theological moorings for professional ethics and the need for congruence in belief, thought, word and deed. Students will examine their own belief systems in relation to ethical practice and construct means by which to embed ethical practice within theses systems. They will deepen their understanding of the intrinsic link between ethical practice and self awareness and assess areas of growth in this regard. Professional codes of ethics (Professional Practice Standards CRPO, CASC Code of Ethics, etc.) will be assessed as the minimum standard for the profession. These codes as well as best practices in the field will be practiced in class. Attention to ethical practice in contexts of diversity is central to course.

This course provides spiritual caregivers with an overview of essential models of psychotherapy using Peter VanKatwyk's (2003) Therapeutic Strategies Map as an orienting framework. Insights from psychotherapeutic theory, sensitively and responsibly applied, enhance the practice of spiritual care. The overview provides a foundation for students who wish to study a particular model in depth and who wish to integrate these concepts into their practice through a supervised learning process. Knowledge of psychotherapeutic theories will also assist spiritual and pastoral providers in making necessary referrals when client needs are outside their scope of practice.

This course provides spiritual caregivers with an overview of essential models of psychotherapy using Peter VanKatwyk's (2003) Therapeutic Strategies Map as an orienting framework. Insights from psychotherapeutic theory, sensitively and responsibly applied, enhance the practice of spiritual care. The overview provides a foundation for students who wish to study a particular model in depth and who wish to integrate these concepts into their practice through a supervised learning process. Knowledge of psychotherapeutic theories will also assist spiritual and pastoral providers in making necessary referrals when client needs are outside their scope of practice.

This course will introduce central theoretical concepts in psychoanalytic psychotherapy and their importance in effective clinical work. An underlying premise of the course is that therapeutic action occurs within the relationship between therapist and patient, two individuals who struggle together to reclaim and deepen their shared humanity. While theory is essential to the task of providing responsible clinical care, it is understood that it always follows deeply attentive, empathic observation, not only of the patient, but of the psychodynamic processes that occur between the therapist and patient. Theory helps to ‘hold’ and ‘contain’ the therapist as she enters the unique, often strange and at times disturbing inner world of the person who seeks her help. Theory must always be held lightly while it is actively operative in the mind of the therapist as he navigates his way through the world that emerges within the analytic setting. A solid grounding in psychodynamic theory helps the therapist maintain a calm receptivity to the patient in the midst of unknowing, which most often characterizes the immediacy of clinical work. It also helps the therapist cultivate and sustain a reflective use of herself that establishes a safe and supportive professional framework that holds and protects both parties in the clinical dyad.

Experiencing worry and anxiety are a normal part of living. Intense worry and anxiety tends to interfere with our ability to cope by causing problems in our daily living, negatively affecting our relationships, thoughts and beliefs, ability to work or play, and spiritual self. Excessive anxiety is life limiting until we discover healthy means to manage intense emotions. This course will offer helping professionals an understanding of the therapeutic principles of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CST) as applied to the experience of anxiety. Students will gain an understanding of two recent modalities of CST, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DST) and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and how these therapies engage worry and anxiety. Students are required to enter this course with a foundational understanding of CST. Spiritual and theological understandings of worry and anxiety will be discussed in addition to applying CST and ACT to the spiritually-oriented client.

Reconciliation in the Church today; a practical "case approach" to the ministry of sacramental reconciliation; art of the confessor.

This entry-level-to-practice, interdisciplinary course will examine the phenomenology of trauma as it impinges on human beings (individuals, families, cultural groups) from a bio-psycho-social-spiritual model of care. Special consideration given to contemporary, evidence-based treatments from a range social science disciplines, as well a credible intervention practices from religious and spiritual traditions- such as mindfulness, hoping-building, meaning-making, and forgiveness protocols- and their potential roles in healing of both direct and vicarious forms of trauma. The following major areas will be explored: 1) Trauma in Childhood, Adolescence, and the Family; 2) Trauma and Disrupted Attachment Relationships; 3) Trauma as Health Crisis {Physical and Mental); 4} Trauma and Women; 5) Trauma as Socio-Historical Events, such as: a) Natural Disasters, b) Terrorism and War Conflicts; c) Cultural Genocide, Religious Persecution and Refugees, d) Cultural Oppression and Victimization of First Nations Peoples; 6) Trauma and Resiliency. Throughout the course will be the pervasive themes of the self-care of the clinician, and the fostering of client resource through spiritual, family and community resources, leading to healing and posttraumatic growth

This course explores psycho-spiritual work with dreams from a Jungian (analytical) psychological perspective. Because Jungian psychology is adaptable with any number of religious traditions, an intrqduction to the role of dreams within Buddhism, Christianity and Islam will be a part of the course. Working with dreams will help students to learn to work with a methodology that has been developed by Jungian psychologists. To supplement work with dreams, an understanding of key Jungian concepts to be presented include the SELF as a God-image, archetypal energy, the personal and collective unconscious, the journey of individuation as a spiritual process. The goal of this course is to help students to be better prepared to work with the dreams of clients/congregants for whom they care at a depth level and particularly during times of heightened stress or end of life.