Ravishing Heaven: The mystical poetry of Jacapone da Todi

The mystics in every faith tradition look to experience and the inner life to inform their experience of the divine, which makes them a subject of great interest to all students of the human soul/psyche. It also often leads them out of step with institutional religion, and makes possible insights considered too “dangerous” for approved theologies.

Jacopone da Todi (c. 1230-1306) was a Franciscan Friar best known for his “Lauds” or poems of praise. Little known today, through the years his work has been both praised and denounced for its grittiness, disregard for poetic conventions of the day, and unapologetic portrayals of the good and bad of Jacopone’s spiritual journey. His tomb is inscribed with this provocative summation of his life: “The blessed bones of Jacapone di Benedictis of Todi, who having gone mad with the love of Christ, by a new artifice deceived the world and ravished heaven.”

Through an examination of his life, context and writing, we’ll explore mystical themes that have given rise to such mixed feelings about him: madness, fear, eroticism, and ecstasy. We will see how, like most mystics, Jacopone transcended first the cultural values of his day, and ultimately even the conventional religious understandings of the institutional church, bringing him into conflict with the highest authorities and even landing him in prison for a substantial portion of his adult life. What these conflicts could never do was to dissuade Jacapone from his path of falling madly, passionately, and even violently in love with the divine.

FACULTY

Brother Damien Joseph, SSF, is a professed member of the Society of Saint Francis, an order of Franciscan Friars in the Episcopal Church and the worldwide Anglican Communion. He currently serves as Provincial Secretary for the American Province. He received a BA from Pennsylvania State University and completed graduate study at Reformed Theological Seminary, Orlando, FL (counseling and theology) and Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, South Hamilton, MA (theology and ministry). He worked in counseling and case management roles in crisis counseling, inpatient mental health, outpatient substance abuse treatment, and correctional counseling. He values his roles as a teacher, a mentor, an advocate and a servant leader.

Maxson J. McDowell, PhD, LMSW, LP, is a senior Jungian analyst in private practice in New York City. Former President of the C.G. Jung Foundation for Analytical Psychology, he is also a longtime faculty member. He has taught courses in dream interpretation online and in person for over 25 years. He has published numerous papers on dream interpretation, Jungian psychology, narcissistic injury, systems theory and autism.

David Rottman, MA, is past President of the C.G. Jung Foundation and is a member of the Jung Foundation’s Continuing Education Faculty. He is the author of The Career as a Path to the Soul. He teaches courses on Jungian psychology in the United States and internationally. He has a private practice and is based in New York.

Maria Taveras, LCSW, is a Jungian analyst in private practice in New York City. She is also an award-winning creator of Dream Art. She creates art from images in her own dreams and is the recipient of two Gradiva Awards from the National Association for the Advancement of Psychoanalysis for her Dream Art. Her Dream Art has been exhibited in New York, San Francisco, Berkeley, London, Montreal, and Cape Town.

David Walczyk, EdD, LP, is a Jungian-trained Psychoanalyst, Professor at NYU for 19 years, and a socially responsible design consultant based in NYC. For over thirty years he has worked at the intersection of creativity, design, psychology, and spirituality. He was a Policy Fellow at the prestigious US National Academy of Sciences in Washington DC, a Visiting Scholar at the US Library of Congress, has worked at Columbia University School of Business and General Electric R&D, and has reviewed and evaluated 10’s of millions of dollars in grant applications for the US Government. He was a member of the Board of the C.G. Jung Foundation of New York and the Buckminster Fuller Institute. Visit http://drdavidwalczyk.com .

Learning Objectives:

Explain the importance of dreams in Jungian psychoanalysis: Jung’s methods of dream interpretation: The Creative Process of Form and Content in Active Imagination, Amplification, Individual Symbol Formation, and Individuation Process
State the difference between ancient religious and mythological notions about the source and purpose of dreams and modern psychological theories.
Discuss how dreaming has been depicted historically in art as a prophetic verbal and visual revelation from another dimension, which psychoanalysis now calls the unconscious.
Explain how artists over the centuries have rendered in impressively profound images the phenomenon of dreaming as an activity essential to the transformation and expansion of consciousness.
By painting dreams of their own in class, participants will directly embody the relation between art and psyche and then have an opportunity to share with other participants their uniquely personal experience of the creative process.

FACULTY

William Baker, PsyD, is a clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst in private practice in New York City. He is currently on the faculty at the Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University, the William Alanson White Institute, and the Philadelphia Association of Jungian Analysts and serves as a member of the editorial staff at the Journal of Analytical Psychology.

Harry W. Fogarty, MDiv, PhD, LP, is a Jungian analyst in private practice in NYC. He is a faculty member of the Philadelphia Association of Jungian Analysts and a former Lecturer in Psychiatry and Religion at Union Theological Seminary.

Ilona Melker, LCSW, is a Jungian Psychoanalyst and Certified Sandplay Therapist. She has taught and lectured at the C.G. Jung Foundation and at national conferences. She has contributed to professional journals. She is in private practice in Manhattan and Princeton, New Jersey.

David Walczyk, EdD, LP, NCPsyA, is a Jungian analyst in private practice in NYC. He is a graduate of Columbia University and the C.G. Jung Institute of NY. He is an award-winning educator, award-winning designer, a writer, and public speaker. He has lectured both domestically and internationally and is on the faculty of New York University.

Sylvester Wojtkowski, PhD, is a Jungian analyst and clinical psychologist in private practice in New York City. He received his doctorate from the New School for Social Research.