ELCA Seminary status check - DOA - Living Lutheran. Coming to WELS-LCMS-ELS

"Brett, your Photoshops do not change one painful fact -
all the seminaries are going down the sewer together, with us."

Seminary status check - Living Lutheran:


"Michael Cooper-White, president of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, said seminary education today takes “a new approach to formation and leadership development. [This] goes beyond checking off a list of courses. We are all looking for ways to better prepare people for the amazingly complex and challenging context of today’s ministry,” he said.

These efforts are occurring amid declining enrollment. Last year 1,627 students were involved in all seminary programs, said Jonathan Strandjord, ELCA program director for seminaries. That reduced number includes people not preparing for pastoral ministry or those already ordained studying for additional degrees.

In 2008, ELCA seminaries graduated 271 students with the Master of Divinity degree that usually leads to ordination. In 2016 there were 173 such graduates, down nearly 100 from eight years ago.

Those numbers parallel the decline in other seminaries affiliated with the Association of Theological Schools, where total seminary enrollment is down as much as 40 percent in other denominations.

GJ - Not to mention the LCMS, WELS, and ELS, which work closely with ELCA but hide this fact from their gullible members.

Merging and moving

United Getty-Philly has a Presbyterian president.
In fact, three new ELCA sem presidents in a row are women.

Several ELCA schools are already making major changes. Gettysburg Seminary, the oldest of the ELCA theological schools, is merging with the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia—a union contemplated as long as 50 years. This year the two schools will become United Lutheran Theological Seminary, with campuses in Philadelphia and Gettysburg.

Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Columbus, Ohio, is merging with nearby Capital University, an ELCA school, in a union that will be completed this year.

Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, Calif., merged with the ELCA’s California Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks. The seminary will sell its aging and expensive-to-maintain campus and is moving downtown near Berkeley City College and the University of California.

Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary in Columbia, S.C., is now affiliated with Lenoir-Rhyne University in Hickory, N.C.

School officials see these moves as not only cost-saving but also as ways to expand the seminary experience.

“For some time, many seminaries had become monastic in nature,” said Wayne Powell, president of Lenoir-Rhyne. Today, he said, “seminaries are becoming more interactive with the real world, which, of course, provides the students with a more practical education.”

Cooper-White said the Gettysburg union with the Philadelphia school was not just a “merger, but a new approach to formation and leadership development.”

Louise Johnson - "more partners."

Seminaries will seek more “partners” in the education of church leaders, said Louise Johnson, president of Wartburg Theological Seminary in Dubuque, Iowa. The partners will include other schools, synods, congregations and other agencies, she said. For example, working through the campus ministry program at the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, Wartburg has five undergraduates taking seminary courses while still in college. The seminary is exploring similar partnerships in Iowa, Minnesota and North Dakota.

The Philadelphia seminary works with congregations in Rochester, N.Y., and Boston to develop local sites for theological education, said David Lose, president of the school.

Curriculum and teaching style is also changing dramatically because the church doesn’t have “the same center of gravity or cultural prominence that it once did,” Lose said. “Congregations can no longer imagine that they are a spiritual destination that people informed by the culture will come to seeking inspiration.” Rather than a “concert hall attended by people who love music,” churches need to be more like a “community music school that equips people to better play music, to play the faith,” he added.

A pastor who leads a congregation will be “less of a performer and more of a coach,” Lose said, adding that the challenge to seminary education is to develop a curriculum content and style of teaching “to train that kind of leader.”

Congregations calling newly ordained pastors will have to prepare themselves for these kinds of leaders (see “A new kind of pastor” for a real hoot)."

 Robin Steinke's Luther Seminary has not merged or moved...yet.
Luther merged some years ago with Northwestern.
What up with LSTC - Chicago?

'via Blog this'

WELS and Missouri already have annual ministry conferences
with ELCA clergy leaders, hosted and planned by Mark Jeske.

Sabra Has Spoken

 Sabra has spoken...anonymously.

WWJD?  He would ask you to learn how to forgive and let go of so much negativity.  It eats you alive and creates no room for Him.  He will help you if you ask Him.

You will find joy once again.  Of this I am confident.  Your website doesn't bring me closer to Him.  It hasn't helped me find a church home.

Blessings,
Sabra

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Let Myrtles Be Myrtle

 The Crepe Myrtle is a bit soggy and heavy with rain,
with more blooms to open.
The plants around its base are Buckwheat, living mulch.
Photo by 29A.

 This is the original view of the yard, with the Ichaboat parked
in the driveway. The neglected Crepe Myrtle is next to the mailbox.
The maple tree suckers on the left almost squeezed out the
weeds and junk around its base.

 My first steps in feeding the Crepe Myrtle involved putting the
trimmings, grass clippings, wood mulch,
and mushroom compost around the base.
I also piled a pyramid of leaves under it for the winter,
and left it there to be absorbed in the early spring.

The Crepe Myrtle is now so glorious that strangers stop on their walks to grab the blossoms and smell them, to marvel at the density of the flowers. Bees work the flowers and birds are nesting there once again.

This is how God's Creation works together. I did not put much labor into this project, but I do a little all the time, week by week.

• I studied Crepe Myrtles because I had them in Bella Vista and they were not impressive. They had potential, I thought.
• I removed all the branches below, which looked silly at first, but emphasized the bloom that summer. Similar to pour-over coffee, the bloom is crucial.
• Previous years of study showed that the way to feed the plant was simply to put organic matter around the base, to be consumed by red wiggler earthworms that I added, supplemented by all the other soil creatures, included our hard-working mole. You be hatin', he be mixin' the soil.
• New studies showed that the fungus network that feeds, protects, and hydrates plants would be helped by wood products (done), and leaving everything alone (no roto-tilling).

People still need to recognize the value of pruning all the time - not a massive effort but a little bit each day. Most plants that we value will grow better with pruning. Pick some peas, beans, or tomatoes - more flowers will sprout and more fruit will grow. The same is true of Crepe Myrtle, roses, and other plants.

Sunday  morning, I cut the best roses for the altar. I was a bit short of roses, so I also cut some Chaste Tree to add purple blossoms to the mix, next to John Paul II white roses - no irony intended. Sunday afternoon, we had an explosion of Easy Does It orange roses. The display on that one rose bush was so brilliant that our guest walked into the garden to photograph it. 

Yes, I welcomed the photography. A gardener with a camera is nowhere near as dangerous as a newbie with a roto-tiller and a jug of insecticide.

Joel Salatin, who is a Christian, writes about honoring the life on the farm or garden - the plants, the soil, and the animals. He is speaking of Creation. His best work that I have read is The Sheer Ecstasy of Being a Lunatic Farmer. He is all over YouTube as well.

Food

The Crepe Myrtle blooms easily, loves the sun, and tolerates a lack of water. That does not excuse neglect, which is the typical reaction. Plant it and forget it. A flowering bush has to have food, which will come from the sun and the soil. I simply put the food around the base, year around, and let the soil creatures carry out their divinely engineered functions. 

Water

When other plants are drooping from the sun and lack of rain, I water them and the Crepe Myrtle. In return, its deep roots and extensive root system direct rain into the subsoil rather than letting the top soil run off onto the sidewalk. 

 We see this around town. The bushes still grow and bloom,
but they do not achieve their real glory,
which was embedded in Creation.

Pruning To Grow

The Crepe Myrtle has more horsepower than a supercharged Ford 150. New branches come out and droop over the mailbox. I cut them off and place them around the base. Some sprouts come from the lower branches. They are cut or pulled away. The first bloom is pruned away later, which means a complete second bloom to round out the summer. Then I let the seeds form. Early spring means pruning and shaping the top, not "crepe murder" where the flowering section is lopped off.

Pruning means spurring growth, above and below ground. Every snip of the shears will encourage more branches and bigger flowers. Below ground, the roots reach out deeper and wider.