BIO:
Peter is the Spiritual Formation Coordinator at the WellSpring Spirituality Centre in Ashburton, and lecturer in Spirituality with Whitley College and through the University of Divinity. He is passionate about cultivating our inner spiritual life, the ministry of spiritual direction and the academic formation journey of spiritual directors and people in ministry.
After ministering for 11 years as an ordained Baptist minister in various parishes, Peter pursued his passion of Spirituality and Spiritual Direction. It started with a Grad Dip, which led to a Masters and resulted in a PHD examining spiritual direction formation and its particular approach to learning has led to a growing number of academic formation subjects.
Peter has vocationally worked with spirituality as the Director of WellSpring, lecturing on Spiritual Direction and Spirituality and coordinating the WellSpring team that supports those in spiritual direction formation. Peter also runs retreats and workshops with a particular interest in the Arts and the Enneagram. Peter is married with three adult daughters and one grandson.
QUALIFICATIONS:
- PhD, Australian Catholic University (“An investigation of learning processes and contexts of a curriculum program for the formation of spiritual directors”)
- MA, University of Divinity (Thesis: “The development of an art retreat that will assist retreatants to describe and more fully understand the experience of spiritual direction through “art creation”)
- GradDip in Spiritual Direction, University of Divinity
- BA in Theology, Ridley College
- GradDip of Education (Tertiary), State College of Vic
- Dip of Engineering, Swinburne Institute of Technology
PUBLICATIONS:
- Bentley, P.S., & Buchanan, M.T., (2017). The Role of Teachers in Promoting Learning in Higher Education Programs (forthcoming)
- Bentley, P.S., & Buchanan, M.T., (2017). Creating Safe Learning Spaces (forthcoming)
- Auer, J., Bentley, P.S., Milne, T., and Truscott, S., (2016) Contemplatively Forming Tomorrow’s Spiritual Directors, Presence, 22(4)
- Bentley, P. S. (2016). The Silver-lined Cloud. In M. Marburg (Ed.), Dreams and desires: Anthology of poetry and prose (pp. 85). Melbourne, Australia: Windsor Scroll Publishing.
- Bentley, P. S., & Buchanan, M. T. (2013). Bridging Further Education and Higher Education in the Formation of Spiritual Directors. Journal of Further and Higher Education, 1-16. doi: 10.1080/0309877X.2013.858678
- Bentley, P. (2013). An Art of Contemplative Practice Course. Religious Education Journal of Australia, 29(1), 45-46.
- Bentley, P. (2012). Gods and Diseases: Making Sense of our Physical and Mental Wellbeing. [Book Review]. Religious Education Journal of Australia, 28(1), 38.
UNITS CURRENTLY TEACHING:
- Art of Contemplative Practice (Postgrad)
- Art of Contemplative Practice 2 (Postgrad)
- Mapping the Soul with the Enneagram (Undergrad) and (Postgrad)
- Spiritual formation: Shaping the teachers and leaders of tomorrow (Postgrad)
- Art of Spiritual Direction 1 (Postgrad)
- Art of Spiritual Direction 2 (Postgrad)
- Art of Spiritual Direction 3 (Postgrad)
RESEARCH AREAS:
- Spiritual formation as an approach to learning
- Enneagram for inner and outer spiritual work
- The Arts in a creative retreat context