A Two-Part Program for the Public and Clinicians
Presented by the Psychotherapy & Spirituality Institute and Kelly Murphy Mason, Psy.D., MS, LICSW
Part I — Public Conversation: Embracing Forgiveness in Unforgiving Times
Offered in partnership with the Spirituality & Flourishing Group in the Harvard Flourishing Network.
An evening for all who seek emotional healing, and deeper understanding.
In an era marked by intense pain, heightened outrage, and increased polarization, offering forgiveness can feel difficult, if not impossible. Yet across wisdom traditions and therapeutic frameworks, the act of forgiving is recognized as an indispensable and humane practice that restores and renews our relationships. It allows us to reclaim our personal agency, to loosen the grip grievance has on us, and to move toward more compassionate living. This talk will consider forgiveness as both a psychospiritual process and ethical stance that simultaneously refuses to absolve, normalize, or legitimate past, present, or future wrongdoing.
This public conversation invites everyone — seekers, believers, and skeptics alike — to explore what embracing forgiveness might mean in such fractured times. Drawing on psychological research, moral philosophy, and spiritual thought, Dr, Kelly Murphy Mason, a community minister and spiritual director, educator and psychotherapist, will help us explore forgiveness not as sentimental gesture, but as courageous and transformative work. We’ll discuss how committing ourselves to a forgiveness practice can open up possibilities for healing within ourselves and our communities.
Location: St. John’s in the Village, Greenwich Village, NYC & Livestreamed via Youtube
Date: April 14th, 2026 6:30 pm – 8:15 pm ET, followed by a reception from 8:15 pm – 9:00 pm
Admission: Open to the public
Cost: Free
Professional Training: Practicing Forgiveness in Unforgiving Times
A 3-Session Online CE Series for Mental Health and Spiritual Care Professionals
4.5 CEC’s
Expanding upon themes from our public conversation on forgiving, this three-session PSI continuing education series explores the psychological, social, and spiritual dimensions of forgiveness practices across clinical and communal contexts. Each 90-minute session offers a combination of theory and practice for clinicians, clergy, and caregivers hoping to expand our emotional capacity to forgive ourselves and others.
Sessions include:
- Forgiving Others – Navigating experiences of betrayal and cruelty, abuse and neglect, oppression and injustice — the insult as well as the injury that individuals all too often sustain — and then considering ways of moving beyond them
- Forgiving Ourselves – Managing our own feelings of guilt, shame, and self-reproach in various personal and professional contexts and finding new learning among our regrets
- Discovering Divine Forgiveness – Understanding how spiritual and religious frameworks can expand our human capacity both to forgive and to be forgiven, and appreciating the transcendent and sacred dimension of forgiveness practices that wisdom traditions underscore.
This series considers forgiveness as both a psychospiritual process and ethical stance that simultaneously refuses to absolve, normalize, or legitimate past, present, or future wrongdoing. Participants will learn skills and strategies for cultivating greater forgiveness in a way that does not bypass but actually dignifies any harm done.
Format: Three 90-minute online sessions on Thursdays, April 16, 23, 30 from 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm ET
Audience: Mental health clinicians, pastoral counselors, clergy, and other caregivers
Continuing Education (CE): Credits available through the Psychotherapy & Spirituality Institute
Kelly Murphy Mason, PsyD, MS, LICSW
Kelly Murphy Mason is an educator, writer, psychotherapist, and spiritual director whose varied career been devoted to integrating spiritual wisdom with psychological insight in the sacred service of helping individuals, healing communities, and fostering fuller human flourishing. She is currently a minister affiliated with the Community Unitarian Universalist Congregation in White Plains, a mentor and instructor at the Phoenix Center for Spiritual Direction, and a book reviewer for Presence, the quarterly journal of Spiritual Directors International. She is also the convener and Co-Chair of the international Spirituality & Flourishing group in the Flourishing Network at the Harvard University Human Flourishing Program. During the last two decades, she has occupied a host of roles in higher education, counseling centers, and faith communities in both New York and New England.
In the past, Dr. Mason acted as Managing Director for the Psychotherapy & Spirituality Institute in Manhattan and taught on the faculties of Union Theological Seminary and Columbia University, two of her alma maters. In addition, she served as Senior Minister for the Unitarian Universalist Society in Wellesley Hills and then Community Minister for Spiritual Direction at Arlington Street Church in Boston. Over the years, she has been a panelist and presenter at local, national, and international programs for colleges, institutes, professional organizations, retreat centers, and hospitals. More recently, she was a speaker at the 2023 Parliament of the World’s Religions in Chicago as well as the global 2025 Gathering of Pilgrims in Vancouver. Print and online publications have interviewed her; she has also published pieces in the academic and popular press and had her personal essays anthologized. For fifteen years now, she has blogged at TheReverendDr.com on the topic of “what heals us in our souls”.
