Nurturing the Call: Spiritual Guidance Program

Do you companion others on their spiritual journeys?
Do others see your spiritual commitment and your gift of spiritual companioning?
Do you desire support and enrichment for this ministry?

If your answers are yes, perhaps the Spirit is calling you to Nurture your Call with Shalem’s Spiritual Guidance Program.

Overview

Nurturing the Call: Spiritual Guidance Program offers both academic resources and experiential support for the ministry of spiritual direction or holy listening. At the heart of this program is the radical conviction that spiritual companionship is a form of prayer and that contemplative listening comes from being grounded in one’s relationship with God.

To learn more about spiritual direction, you may  view Shalem’s Pamphlet on Spiritual Direction here.

Timeline & Components

Early Bird by 11/30/20
Regular by 1/15/21

Program Dates
(The program includes at-home work before the first residency, between residencies and after the second residency.)

At-Home Work: March-June 2021
1st Residency: August 10-19, 2021
At-Home Work: Sept 2021-June 2022
2nd Residency: June 21-30, 2022
At-Home Integrative Phase: Sept-Dec 2022

Program Components
At-Home Work & Two Residencies

Participants do much of the program work in their own communities, coming to the Baltimore/Washington area for residencies twice during each program.

At-home work includes:

• • Receiving and offering one-to-one spiritual guidance;
  • Mutual support and accountability with a self-established peer group;
  • Reading of selected texts, including classics and specific topical material;
  • Several brief theme papers;
  • Periodic reports to Shalem;
  • Personal journal-keeping;
  • A personal spiritual practice;
  • Self-scheduled, solitary retreat days;
  • A 6-12-page final paper.

Residencies include:

• • Topical seminars (sampling follows):
    – Classics of Christian spirituality
    – The arts and spirituality
    – Scripture and spiritual direction
    – Discernment
    – Group spiritual direction
    – Social vision and the spiritual life
    – Contemporary social contexts
    – Spirituality in our time;
  • Practicums in prayer and spiritual discipline;
  • Individual interviews with staff;
  • Guided, silent retreat time;
  • Supervised peer groups, group processing, and reflection;
  • Participant-led morning and evening prayer.

Our desire is to foster a community of peers within a prayerful atmosphere. Frequent sessions on prayer will expose a broad range of prayer forms and issues, both theoretically and experientially.

A Certificate of Completion is awarded upon completion of all program requirements.