A Seminary's Bicententennial and the Future of Ministerial Education

1n 1808, with Unitarians taking over Harvard, the Congregationalists founded Andover Seminary. Andover would be the first free-standing American seminary. It's 4-fold division of theological education -- bible, theology, church history, practical ministerial arts -- became the foundation for theological education for the years that followed -- really up until today. The question is, as Andover Newton marks this historic moment, will seminaries or graduate theological education survive into the future?
In an article today in the NY Times that question is asked. We are told that in America there are 165 seminaries, with 39% of students studying at 20 of them -- all but 2 being evangelical. As a graduate of one of those 20 (Fuller Theological Seminary). Many seminaries are struggling to survive or changing their identity to cope with the future -- Seabury Western Seminary (an Episcopal School in the Chicago area) is dropping its residential M.Div. program. Indeed, many seminaries are not only adding satellite campuses but offering more and more of their programs on-line. In this article it is pointed out that a key to survival is the ability to fund raise or have a mighty endowment. Schools like Harvard, Yale, and Chicago have large endowments. Fuller, which is fairly young, has learned to be effective in fund-raising.
As the article points out Andover Newton (a school that formed from a merger of UCC and American Baptist Seminaries in 1965) isn't in dire straights, but it understands that changes must take place if it is to survive. And the question is -- what will change look like?
Critics of seminary education as it stands -- like Tony Jones, whose book The New Christians offers strong criticism suggest that ministry education must recognize that the church is changing and becoming less institutional. I must point out that Tony is a graduate of Fuller and is completing a Ph.D. at Princeton. But he may be right -- more and more education may take place in congregational settings. And more and more of us who have advanced theological education will find ourselves in parishes rather than educational institutions. I must confess that it wasn't my intention to be a pastor -- I wanted to be in the seminary context. But here I am, in my 10th year of parish ministry sporting a Ph.D. in historical theology!
So, here's my question to you who read this -- what is your sense of the future of theological education? In other words, will Andover Newton be around to celebrate the 250th anniversary of its founding?

Comments

Anonymous said…
Our movement makes much of our ability to form clergy without having them go through traditional three-year MDiv programs in brick-and-mortar seminaries. I think when our jurisdictions really take their job of doing formation seriously, we do a great job. (And when traditional seminaries don't take their job of forming leaders for Christian ministry seriously, I think we do a better job than they do.)

That said, while I hope the mainline moves to a more organic, localized kind of formation, I hope seminaries don't go away entirely. There are things a good seminary can do that a good local formation program cannot. And while the average parish pastor may do fine with a local (diocesan or conference-level) formation that is deeply connected to local communities, many calls are not "average" or parochial.

In our case, I think some of the best bishops in our movement have traditional MDivs. My bishop's degree is from Harvard Div School. He has a good grounding in academic theology and is therefore able to encourage others to focus on continuing education rather than feel threatened by it. We have good bishops without MDivs, but all things being equal I'm glad more and more of our bishops are getting them.

For myself, my formation has been ok but I do hope to go back and get an MDiv at some point.

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