Christianity and Education

David Singh

• Publisher: Regnum
• Year: 2011
• Print ISBN: 9781870345811
• eBook ISBN: 9781908355713
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Ministry

Christianity and Education is a collection of papers published in Transformation: An International Journal of Holistic Mission Studies over a period of 15 years. It brings to life some of the papers that lay buried in shelves and in disparate volumes of Transformation, under a single volume for theological libraries, students and teachers. The articles here represent a spectrum of Christian thinking addressing issues of institutional development for theological education, theological studies in the context of global mission, contextually aware/informed education, and academies which deliver such education, methodologies and personal reflections.

PART 1

Institutional Development for Theological Education

Transforming Theological Education through Multi-Institutional Partnerships

Timothy Dearborn

The Rev. Dr. Timothy Dearborn is Associate Director for Faith and Development with World Vision International.

Introduction

We have entrusted to our seminaries and theological schools a daunting responsibility. They are expected to prepare wise, compassionate, theologically astute and pastorally proficient servants who can lead the church and our societies through the crises of the twenty-first century. However, during this century, the theological schools of the Western world have adopted methods for fulfilling this responsibility which, some would say, guarantee their failure. Others, who are more gracious, would admit that current methods at least make success difficult. If the goal is indeed to prepare creative, visionary, dynamic leaders who love God, love people and love God’s purposes in the world with a contagious passion, we could not have intentionally chosen more inadequate means.

To state the problem in extreme terms, I am coming to the conclusion that there is no other professional organization in the world which allows its primary professional training institutions to produce graduates who are generally as functionally incompetent as the church permits her seminaries. Most pastors feel unprepared by their seminary education for the demands of pastoral ministry. Can you imagine a medical school retaining its certification if its graduates’ first exposure to surgery was as the surgeons? They may have had brilliant lectures on anatomy and oncology. They may even have seen colour slides of brain surgery. Possibly they were provided with cadavers upon which they could practice. They successfully complete difficult written examinations, and at graduation are given their first stethoscopes and scalpels. Now, for the first time in their life, they see human flesh being cut into. They watch surgical saws cut through human skull bones. And their hands are wielding the weapons! Tragically, that’s the scenario most of our seminaries and theological schools are still following. The first memorial service I ever attended in my life was as the officiant. The first time I had ever seen someone die in the hospital was as their pastor. The first sermon I ever preached was before a congregation. The first couple in marriage crisis I ever encountered was as their supposed therapist. The first budget I ever saw developed was as a programme administrator.

I may have been able to write 20-page papers on heaven, prepare brilliant strategies for church growth and articulate a clear understanding of marriage. I knew great theories of communication and the servant role of the pastor. However, no one had ever guided me in how to live out these truths. Even worse, many people emerge from seminary less equipped for ministry than they entered. Eager students entrust three years of their lives to a seminary in order to be better equipped to love God, people and the world with all their hearts, soul, strength and mind. Yet too often they graduate feeling spiritually cold, theologically confused, biblically uncertain, relationally calloused and professionally unprepared.

Tragic Consequences

The results of this are obvious. It has rightly been said that the church is like Columbus: going to a destination he knew not where, seeking something he would not recognize once he found it, and doing it all on someone else’s money. There is an extraordinary absence of clarity regarding the role of pastors. During 1994, I assisted the Murdock Charitable Trust of Vancouver, WA in conducting a study of the future of theological education in the Pacific Northwest of the U.S. One component of the study was to survey hundreds of laypersons, pastors and seminary professors regarding the qualities of a good pastor. No suggestions were given. Rather, participants described their own perceptions. The discrepancy among the three groups is very revealing. Especially interesting is the different priority placed on spirituality (first for laypersons, fourth for clergy, non-existent for professors); on theological knowledge (first for professors, and fifth for laity and clergy); that only laypersons esteemed relational skills among clergy; that clergy placed highest priority on their position as role models (a role that neither laypersons nor professors valued for pastors); and that pastors omitted placing a priority on their own character!

No wonder there exists the most serious disenchantment of seminaries, pastors and laypersons with one another in history. Many churches are deciding that they can more adequately prepare leaders themselves, and are not sending students to seminaries. Some denominations are altering their degree requirements and determining that an MDiv, the traditional North American degree required for clergy, is not necessary. A growing number of laypersons are questioning the importance of ordination and the specialized role of pastors. Further, they are becoming disillusioned with large churches which function more like poorly run corporations than the Body of Christ. Laypersons feel under-valued and under-equipped. I have interviewed over 150 laypersons from various occupations over the past three years. More than 90 per cent indicated that they have never received any significant support, guidance or even interest regarding their jobs from their pastor. The church is more interested in their volunteer time than in their occupations. Their jobs are validated as means to other ends: income to contribute to Christian causes, places of evangelism, ways to deepen the credibility of the church. Few find from their church significant support or guidance in integrating their work into their faith, and in addressing the complex ethical, economic and leadership issues they face at work with the resources of the Gospel. Furthermore, professors feel under attack. The rules for their roles have changed without anyone telling them. It used to be that the sole requirement was for them to be outstanding academicians. Now, they are being criticized by their administrators, students and the church for failing to do that which they did not know they were supposed to, and for which they feel very unequipped. In addition to being brilliant scholars in their fields, professors are now expected to be enthusiastic classroom performers – able to hold the attention of tired adult students in evening lectures; experienced and veteran pastors; compassionate counsellors able to help students through complex personal crises; seasoned missionaries and urban evangelists; spiritual directors for their students; and skilled mentors in ministry of students as well as graduates.

A final consequence is the tragic fact that our Christian institutions – schools and seminaries, churches and mission societies are more driven by the dictates of the market than by the force of their vision for the coming Kingdom. Our major Christian magazines would go out of business if it were not for the revenue gained by advertisements from seminaries. The number of MDiv students in North America has remained static over the past ten years, about 28,000 students. The number of institutions and programmes has increased dramatically. Thus, institutions (and churches are no exception), are relentlessly seeking to be seeker-sensitive, providing people what they want before their competitors get to them

Simple Solution: Five-fold Transformation

The solution to this tragedy is obvious and simple. For the last three years, I have had the privilege of leading an innovative effort to provide an alternative. When I say ‘obvious’, I must admit that not everyone is convinced; and when I say ‘simple’, I do not mean ‘easy’. The political and organizational complexities of the solution we are developing create the most demanding challenge I have ever encountered. Friends who are executives in major corporations indicate to me that they have never encountered in business anything as complex as that in which I am engaged, theological education. However, I still insist that the solution is simple and obvious. I will illustrate it by looking at a very different professional education system.

In 1911, the U.S. government concluded a major survey of physician competency in the U.S. They determined that the graduates of two medical schools were significantly better prepared than those from all others. Johns Hopkins and Harvard were more effective for one reason: they were the only medical schools in partnership with teaching hospitals. Within five years of the publication of this study, every medical school in the U.S. had entered into partnerships with hospitals. This is precisely what we are doing in Seattle – developing partnerships between theological schools and teaching churches. I will describe how it is being developed by contrasting the current seminary approach with the one we are implementing, which I audaciously will call the approach of the future. I am convinced that if we can successfully develop this model, then in the years to come, most graduate theological education programmes will be partnerships between schools and churches. I will describe what this looks like as a five-fold transformation in theological education through multi-institutional partnerships. The transformation is fundamentally simple, for all it involves us: transforming the institution; transforming the curriculum; transforming the faculty; transforming the student; and, transforming the process!

Transforming the Institution: Who Provides Theological Education?

I believe I have said enough about the separation that exists between churches and seminaries. However, more needs to be said about the separation among seminaries themselves. One of the objectives of seminary education is to prepare leaders who can participate in the Holy Spirit’s work of building the Body up into unity in Christ. Yet, seminaries exist in fierce competition one with another. Each guards its best programme secrets as if confronted with the worst forms of corporate espionage. Bidding for premier faculty members rivals that between professional sports teams. The marketing of institutions is increasingly expensive and slick, spending millions of dollars to employ ad agencies who market seminaries as they would tennis shoes and new model cars.

As in business, the future of theological education rests in creative partnerships between multiple institutions that enter into joint ventures in order to design and deliver a better ‘product’ that could be done autonomously. Instead of competition existing extrinsically, between rival institutions, those which are the most successfully creative invite an element of healthy competition within their enterprise through joint ventures. The Seattle Association is a joint venture between three academic institutions and over 45 churches which seeks to unite the best of academia and the best of the parish in instructional partnerships. This overcomes both the captivity of theological education to theory, and the intrinsic resistance to change found among all academicians. Similarly, it overcomes the pragmatic and parochial bias of the parish, giving churches an opportunity to benefit from wider vistas. We believe that just as accreditation by the academy is indispensable for theological education, it must become equally indispensable to receive accreditation by the churches.

Several convictions are foundational to this approach. First, theological education is the privileged responsibility of the whole people of God. Church and seminary, professors and pastors, laypersons and religious ‘professionals’ all have vital contributions in the formation of people for pastoral ministry. Churches have always been expected to own the ‘product’ of theological education. Now they need to own their share of the ‘process’. We’ve implemented through boards and advisory bodies, processes through which decisions about faculty, curriculum, and academic policies are made mutually by representatives from the academy, the parish and the workplace. Further, we have implemented mentoring relationships through which pastors and laypersons are involved directly in providing instruction. Second, theological education is best provided to part-time students who are full-time Christian servants. Training for ministry should occur in ministry, rather than before ministry. Students need the time to integrate into their lives that which they are learning. Third, the location in which instruction occurs should reflect the goal of the instruction. Rather than having the majority of classes in the academy, which reflects a world of theory and even detachment from ordinary life, we have our course in churches, office buildings, prisons, and drop-in centres for prostitutes. We want the very walls to teach, calling students to the integration of theory and praxis. We offer 50 courses a year, and use over 20 different locations for classes.

As a result of these convictions, we believe that the academy and the church must be knit together so that each can contribute its distinctive roles to the formation of people for ministry. We believe there is a five-fold community which must be formed between the church and the seminary in order to maximize each other’s unique contribution to the formation of people for ministry. First, they exist as a spiritual community, for each is part of the Body of Christ. The prime role for each is indeed as a ‘seminary’ – a ‘seedbed for piety’, and each participates in the Spirit’s work of equipping the people of God to be built up into unity in Christ. Second, they form a hermeneutical community. Each has a distinct contribution in enabling Christians to reflect about the biblical-theological-historical ‘text’, and to reflect about our present cultural-social ‘context’. Such reflection is deficient without the input of the other partner. Third, they provide a community of critical inquiry. Both have roles in submitting the people of God to a loving, critical reflection about their faith and practice. The academy’s critical reflection without being rooted in the realities of the parish and world can be esoteric and fantastical. The church’s self-criticism, without the objective detachment of the academy, can be culturally captive and narcissistic. Fourth, they exist as a praxiological community. Each provokes the other to envision and implement ever more faithful expressions of the coming Kingdom of God. The church calls the academy to be faithful to God’s mission in people’s lives. The academy calls the church to ministry with biblical and theological integrity. Fifth, they provide the world with expressions of a community of cooperation. Our balkanized, militarized world, in which religious people are tragically on the frontline of schisms, distrust and separatism, urgently needs visible expressions of community in diversity. In our programmes, students, laypersons and pastors gather from over fifty different denominations to study, pray and reflect together. There is no similar gathering point that draws the people of God in all their diversity around the Person of Christ. Though disagreements over ecclesiology, eschatology and missiology are usually intense, thoug...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Abstracts
• On Being Theologically Educated: Ten Key Characteristics
• Part 1: Institutional Development for Theological Education
• Part 2: Global Mission and Theological Studies
• Part 3: Contextual Theological Education
• Part 4: Theological Education and the State University
• Part 5: Methodologies for Theological Studies
• Part 6: Personal Reflections
• Bibliography
• Subject Index
• Back Cover