Global Jung spirituality seminar at UNCW this weekend

What is the nature of good versus evil? Does God have a shadowy side?

Those were questions debated during 10 years of letter-writing in the 1940s between Father Victor White, a Catholic theologian, and Dr. Carl Jung, a famous psychologist who meshed psychological analysis with dream interpretation and factored in a person’s spirituality into their diagnosis.

This weekend folks at the University of North Carolina Wilmington will get a chance to participate in a live global ...

theatrical performance of the The Jung-White Letters, a play written using the text of their correspondence that wrestles with some really tough spiritual questions. The interactive video seminar is organized through The Asheville Jung Center and is being broadcast to 17 sites on five continents.

UNCW’s global seminar starts at 8:30 a.m. Nov. 7 in room 266 of the UNCW School of Education with the play. Then a live discussion will follow between all the sites, mediated by Jungian expert Dr. Murray Stein with the International School of Analytical Psychology in Zurich, Switzerland.

The Counseling Center at UNCW is one of the sponsors for the event.

“Jung believed that there’s a sickness of our time that psychology and social institutions didn’t recognize people’s spiritual sense,” said Dr. Paul Overman, director of the Counseling Center. ”He saw a deprivation of spirit in what was needed for true healing.”

Jung and Sigmund Freud were contemporaries but they differed on the importance of spirituality to a person’s psyche.

“Carl Jung was neat because he was one of the few psychologists who integrated spirituality into his practice where as Sigmund Freud was very anti-spiritual and saw God as a crutch,” said Dr. Steven Buser, director of The Asheville Jung Center, in a recent public radio interview with WNCW FM.

Overman said pastors, psychology or religion majors, psychologists, therapists and just people who are into self-growth might be interested in learning more about Carl Jung and his approach to psychology.

The fee to attend the seminar is $40 per person or $20 for students or UNCW faculty.

Watch a trailer of the theatrical presentation below.

Hide