Last week TGC asked seminary professors and presidents what one thing they would change about seminary. Vigorous exchange ensued among commenters over the strengths and weaknesses of traditional seminaries for equipping minister of the gospel. The series continues this week with another response from a veteran seminary administrator.
Ric Cannada Jr., chancellor and CEO, Reformed Theological Seminary:
More practical ministry experience under mentors as early and as often as possible would be my desire for every seminary student. We all learn even more by doing, by putting into practice what we are learning in the classroom. We learn more deeply and clearly what we are hearing in the classroom by organizing the material and teaching it ourselves to others. In practical areas especially, we learn more about counseling or pastoral care or worship or weddings or board meetings by actually participating in these experiences and especially by giving leadership in them.
I believe it is a good thing that more and more students are spreading out their three-year Master of Divinity degree program for four or five years if they are using those additional years to be involved in ministry while they are in seminary. In fact, a significant number of our students at RTS are doing this. Also, our vision of multiple regional campuses encourages and allows for this involvement in ministry while at seminary. Instead of having to leave their home church and try to find a new place of ministry in a new community at a seminary away from home, more students are able to stay where they live currently and continue in their present ministry while they are enrolled in seminary. This is true as well for those students who are enrolled in our degree program through the Virtual Campus of RTS, in which the students are not only enabled to stay in their home location and ministry but are also required to have a mentor during their distance degree program.
One additional part of this seminary dream for more involvement in practical ministry involves money. I would love to be able to offer enough scholarship help to every needy student so that no seminary student has to take out loans for seminary education or has to work a secular job while in seminary in order to cover the costs. My alma mater, Vanderbilt University, in 2008, entered into an ambitious program to do away with all Vanderbilt loans to students and replace the student loans with grants and scholarships. I wish every evangelical seminary had the funding to follow this example so that every student could focus on their studies and be involved in local ministry putting their studies into practice without having to take out loans (that may be impossible to repay on a pastor’s salary) and without having to work in a job outside church ministry while in seminary in order to pay for seminary education.
An impossible dream? Perhaps. But I understand that for many years in our country seminary students did not have to pay any tuition. With enough financial support this could be true again, at least providing full grants and scholarships for all students with demonstrated need. The point is that I would change the financial model, so that the cost of preparing ministers falls less on the backs of students who are already sacrificing to prepare for ministry and will have a future of limited financial gain as pastors and more on the church in general which benefits from the selfless service of our ministers and missionaries. I would do this with the hope that more students would be actively involved in ministry throughout their seminary education so that they are learning from doing as well as from the classroom.
Is there enough evidence for us to believe the Gospels?
In an age of faith deconstruction and skepticism about the Bible’s authority, it’s common to hear claims that the Gospels are unreliable propaganda. And if the Gospels are shown to be historically unreliable, the whole foundation of Christianity begins to crumble.
