Thursday, June 22, 2006
Question of the Day
Let's say that it were within your power to change seminary education completely from scratch. Instead of making minor reforms, you could change seminary as a concept. What would this new institution be like?
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8 comments:
John,
What a sweeping question! I would totally change seminary education to the following model:
Year 1: Biblical Studies and theology. Nothing else.
Year 2: Preaching and evangelism focus; pastoral care/counseling as option as well.
Year 3: LEADERSHIP, LEADERSHIP, LEADERSHIP - how to manage other people, work with boards and committees, how to initiate change even against resistance, time management for pastoral life, leading churches in visioning God's call, etc.
In my experience, seminary training is most lacking in the area of leadership. Currently, seminaries train people to be theologians and perhaps adequate preachers. However, they do not do a very good job of training people to challenge their congregations to live out the gospel in the world, and that is because a challange like that requires very real leadership qualities.
I have often wondered about whether people can really be trained in "leadership," but we'll never know if seminaries don't try . . .
I don't think that one can be taught leadership, except to people in leadership positions at the time.
I learned so much in my year as a library supervisor that I never would have learned from a hundred books on leadership.
I have often wondered about whether people can really be trained in "leadership,"
Absolutely and successfully, yes. Not everyone has leadership in their blood, but many, many who do have it don't have a foggy clue how to do it.
how to initiate change even against resistance,
And that is one of the main things leadership training corrects. The point is to change the change so that there is no longer resistance. People seldom resist for stupid reasons. When we change our plans to accommodate "the resistance" we are almost always making them better, not worse.
How would I change a seminary?
I like Larry's ideas. I would add to that not letting people in until they have families and a means of supporting them - or have in some other meaningful way proven that they can handle life and relationships. Our leaders need to be older.
Larry's suggestions are on target. However, I would begin the leadership classes in the second year. I did an internship my third year and leadership would have served me better than the "who wrote the first Gospel, Matthew or Mark?"
I would add at least one unit of CPE.
Discipleship including leadership training, biblically based.
A business course or two oh and janitor skills -since pastors of small congregations are expected to be jack-of-all-trades irrespective of gender.
oh and a requirement for teaching staff in seminary would be time IN a pastoral position on a regular basis ...
and other denominations too ... I think that gives good balance.
I agree a million % with basic church leadership info. You can't teach it, but you can develop it, and I know in my seminary experience, that was really the one thing that was not addressed as much as I would have liked.
I also agree that seminary student should be in some sort of ministerial setting. Memphis Theological, where I graduated from, had a great number of folks serving churches, and much of class become more of a reflection upon ministry than a theoretical exersize.
Some good suggestions thus far, but my primary suggestion would be to pair seminary students up with Christian leaders (mostly thinking pastors, but other leaders as well) who will take time to mentor in a working environment. Student could serve as an intern and be mentored by the leader of that church/ministry.
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