A theologian-friend asked for some ideas, for a conference-paper he's giving...

Preface: I've been privileged to have been a teacher/'adjunct prof' at several seminaries in several countries, and although it's difficult to generalize, here are a few of my thoughts in two sections:

1. Major Creative Initiatives:

1-1: Theological colleges preparing future pastors for pastoral ministry as 'vocational seminaries' rather than purely academic institutions. About 95% of the pastors I talk to can't see the value of Greek, Hebrew, and much of church history in their day-to-day pastoring... They'd have preferred a crash-course in using a lexicon etc. then more 'transferable concepts' of a practical nature. Fortunately this is gradually changing.

1-2: Pedagogical methodologies moving from 'jug-to-mug' tranfer of information, to transformative, interactive, action/reflection, 'redemptive' models of teaching (see Henri Nouwen's excellent little book on this - Creative Ministry - which contrasts redemptive and coercive models of education). And theology 'lectures' (for example)

which don't have a 'wow' element to them are, I believe, not conducive to doing much more than equipping people to pass exams rather than pass on something transformative.

2. A couple of specific ideas:

2-1 The DMin students I taught at Fuller Seminary were excited by the idea of writing a chapter for publication in a devotional book (in the Still Waters Deep Waters series) as part of their class-work. IOW, their efforts were not simply to collect dust somewhere but provide spiritual nuture to many others... My own DMin dissertation was published as a book, together with a kit comprising DVDs, discussion questions etc.

2-2 A Presbyterian theological student in Melbourne uses his acquired learning to edit Wikipedia articles on the topics he's studying. He's worked on about 20+ articles there already.

2-3 Others engage with people on Usenet newsgroups (see http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/16255.htm), Blogs, etc.

2-4 Several seasoned clergy have wondered, in our conversations, why they've never been asked to interact with trainee-pastors in our seminaries. Although they might not be academics, they felt that half a century's ministry-experience might have something to offer future pastors!

There's a lot more, but that'll do!

Rowland Croucher

8th April 2008