This course provides students with a framework for understanding the adolescent time period as a window of opportunity for healthy growth and development for the whole person with a special emphasis on spiritual maturity. Students will examine major theories and findings concerning biological, cognitive, social, and emotional development during adolescence. A primary objective of this course is to help students become knowledgeable about the latest research on the time period of adolescence and apply this research to counseling adolescents towards spiritual maturity. The course will be organized using the following framework: Primary changes of adolescence (the developmental changes that make adolescence distinctive such as puberty, neurobiological, etc.) the contexts of adolescence (the settings in which these primary changes play out including family, peer group, schools, and religious institutions) and the secondary changes of adolescence (the psychological consequences of the interaction between the primary changes and the settings, organized into the domains of identity, autonomy, intimacy, sexuality, achievement, and spirituality). The course will conclude with discussions about how to counsel and help adolescents.