Jon Bartlett, M.Ed.

Coordinator for Spirituality and Wellbeing,

Division of Student Affairs

Spirituality @ UNT

IntroductionIt’s poll time!

Instructions: Use your cell phone to vote.Text the number that corresponds with your choice

to the number at the top of the slide.You can only respond once.

Getting Started

Religion: “Religiousness typically involves membership in some kind of community of fellow believers and practitioners, as well as participation in ceremonies or rituals” (Astin, 2011).

Spirituality: “…Spirituality has to do with the values that we hold most dear, our sense of who we are and where we come from, our beliefs about why we are here—the meaning and purpose that we see in our work and our life—and our sense of connectedness to one another and to the world around us. Spirituality can also bear on aspects of our experience that are not easy to define or talk about, such things as intuition, inspiration, the mysterious, and the mystical” (Astin, 2011).

Definitions

There’s room for everyone at the table, regardless of what you believe.

What it comes down to: How do you make meaning?

The Big Picture

Spirituality

Inner Developme

ntReligion

The Heinz Dilemma:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxJ07klMhr0 Pair up with a person sitting near you and

discuss what you would do if you were in Heinz’s situation.

Activity

Whether you are aware of it or not, you will

encounter subjects with religious and/or

spiritual implications throughout your time in

college…

Spirituality/Religion in College

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre    The falcon cannot hear the falconer;    Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,    The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere    The ceremony of innocence is drowned;    The best lack all conviction, while the worst    Are full of passionate intensity.     Surely some revelation is at hand;    Surely the Second Coming is at hand.    The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out    When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi    Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand;    A shape with lion body and the head of a man,    A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,    Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it    Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.     The darkness drops again but now I know    That twenty centuries of stony sleep    Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,    And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,    Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”

-The Second Coming, William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

In Literature Classes…

In History Classes…

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness…”

In Political Science Classes…

In Science Classes

Galileo Galilei

But sometimes it’s more subtle than that.

Any time you are exploring your…PurposeValuesCareer/Vocational Goals

…you’re potentially drawing on your spiritual

beliefs.

Spirituality/Religion in College

…is critically important to who you are. It’s

part of your identity.

For many of you, college represents the first

chance you’ve had to critically reflect on what

you believe outside of the confines of your

family and home culture.

“Know thyself.”

What You Believe…

UNT wants to support you in your

spiritual/inner-development.

There are a number of campus resources that

could be beneficial to you as you explore your

beliefs.

Consider the following tips:

Recommendations

Spend time in quiet self-reflection.This could be in the form of prayer or

meditation, but it doesn’t have to be.

Reflect!

Goolsby Chapel

Counseling and Testing, Chestnut Hall

For the sake of your sanity, turn everything off once in a while. Experience quiet.

Go Unplugged!

Seek out interactions with people who are different from you.

Practice:ToleranceHospitalityUnderstandingRespectAcceptance“Holy Envy”

Diversify!

UNT-International, IELI OfficeSycamore Hall, 940-565-2003

Give back to your community through service and philanthropy.

Give Back!

The Center for Leadership and Service, Union 422

Activities include:• Make a

Difference Day• The Big Event• Alternative

Spring Break

If being connected to a house of worship is important to you, and something you did before you came to UNT, consider finding one in or near the Denton area that fits your needs.

Worship?

Find someone you respect who is older than you and learn from them.Could be an upperclassmen: Multicultural

Center, Buddy System (peer mentoring program)

Could be a faculty/staff member: Seriously, we’re normal people.

Could be a campus minister or someone from your place of worship.

Get Mentored!

Find a student organization that represents your beliefs and values.

Student Activities Center, Union 320, studentactivities.unt.edu

Get Involved!

Questions? Comments?Contact me:

Jon BartlettChestnut 155B

jon.bartlett@unt.edu940-565-3288

In Closing