I’ve been trying to catalog all the changes in theological education since the days when I was a seminary student. The most obvious changes are in the makeup of the student body. When I first arrived at Luther Seminary in 1974, the church had at that time only been ordaining women for about 5 years. I think there was way less than a dozen women in my class when I graduated in 1978. But now, women are pretty close to parity with men in the total enrollment. Besides being virtually all male, back in the day, we were almost all white. We had a few African pastors on campus doing advanced study before returning to the churches in their homeland, but I can only recall one African-American student in my class, and he was Episcopalian. Luther Seminary continues to educate pastors from around the world, but the student body is much more racially and socially diverse than when I began study. And that’s especially true in the D. Min. program in which I’m training. Then, too, when I started seminary, there was really only one track toward ordination, which meant moving to the seminary, spending three years on campus in classes, and one year in parish internship. That would entail at least four moves in four years. (Moving to campus, moving to internship site, moving back to campus, then moving to first call at the end of seminary.) The explosion in communication technology has now made distance learning possible in a way I could never have imagined. In the coming year I’ll be doing research, staying in touch with students and faculty, submitting sermons, papers, and projects, all online. It’s a brave new world, and I’m glad to see it.
Peace.
