Description and Objectives

The Heights School

11th and 12th Grade English

Fall 2026

Instructor: Patrick Miggins, B.A., M. Ed.

Email: pmiggins@heights.edu

Phone: (301)365-0227 (ext. 123)

ENG 318 Spiritual Journeys

Overview:

Spiritual Journeys will be a class exploration of spiritual growth, insight, and wisdom as seen through various protagonists from famous tales and selected short stories.  The class is designed with young pilgrims in mind, those who seek to continue the journey along the path of truth, beauty, goodness, and grace, and take note of the moral growth of a variety of everyman characters.  Studying the Medieval mystery play of Everyman as a template for spiritual journeys, we will explore the relationship that our protagonists have with their own mortality and the effect that the realization of their fallenness has on their conscience.  We will track their change of heart along their individual and particular spiritual journeys, and examine the various universal truths by which we can draw inspiration from their example.

Conceptualizing how Everyman serves a progenitor and archetype of a variety of dramatic narratives, we will appreciate memorable protagonists who undergoe spiritual enlightenment and redemption.  Special emphasis will be placed on awakening one’s faith through contrition and a recognition of the inestimable gift of life itself.  The protagonist will hear his call to conversion by way of attaining a more clear and correct conscience.  Other deep dive stories we will discuss in the wake of Everyman include: Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale, Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, William Faulkner’s The Bear, “The Devil and Daniel Webster” and “The Bishop’s Beggar”, two short stories by Stephen Vincent Benet, “The Greatest Gift” by Philip Van Doren Stern (short story toat Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life was based upon), “Leaf by Niggle” by J.R.R. Tolkien, and “Parker’s Back” by Flannery O’Connor.

 

 

 

 

Textbooks

Texts:

Everyman (anonymous Medieval mystery play)

The Bear by William Faulkner

-Selected short stories by William Faulkner, Stephen Vincent Benet, Philip Van Doren Stern, Flannery O’Connor, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Walter Macken, J.R.R. Tolkien, and others.

 

Course Requirements

Course Requirements: 

Students should expect daily notes and classroom discussion, daily reading assignments, weekly quizzes and frequent writing assignments of various length, spanning from the reflective essay and poem analysis, to the in-class essay, and then to the traditional typed composition paper.  In addition, once a quarter, students will be required to memorize and to recite a poem, typically a sonnet, for a grade.

There will be a comprehensive mid-semester examination, which will contain the rudiments of genre theory. 

Writing assignments will be completed in class or at home and will typically take place each week.

In-class writing assignments will usually be open-book.

Take-home writing assignments must be typed and cite the text(s) according to MLA format.

Late papers will be accepted, but with a penalty of a letter grade drop for every class period the assignment is late.      

Class participation is required whether it takes the form of effective insights or the asking of probing questions.  At the end of each grading period, class participation will play a role in improving, maintaining, or decreasing the student’s grade for the quarter.

 

Successful Students

Successful students will respect the subject matter and be dedicated to daily effort both in class and at home.  A good student respects the space this class brings to bear on his sense of honor, knowing that he owes his teacher and his peers thoughtful effort and a mature demeanor, mindful that he will be learning alongside and among his peers and his instructor.

A volunteer representative will serve as a “manager of mirth” to help the instructor schedule gatherings of literary levity, festivity, and refreshment that supersede day-to-day classroom enjoyment.