Of Grief and God: Sociological Perspectives on Loss

Catalog description

This interdisciplinary course asks what kind of God can allow us to experience loss or death, and how we relationally experience grief in response to the nature and end of human life. We will explore how Catholic theology and other perspectives respond to questions of God’s existence and goodness in the face of loss, both historically and in today’s context. We will also consider several sociological and practice-based texts to sharpen our instincts and improve our skills in supporting others through grief. We will learn about cultural rituals, social support systems, and the communal nature of grief. By the end of the course, we will have examined and reflected upon both our assumptions and the formations of our individual perspectives on the goodness of God and the goodness of grief.