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| Yes, I was there, interviewed at the Philly Seminary around 1981. Someone was already hired, so others were interviewed to meet the demands of HEW. Hence, it was called an HEW interview - a free trip to Philly. |
Lutheran Seminary Fires President:
"Latini said via email that she was being scapegoated, and that United Lutheran was facing challenges from its recent creation from merging two Lutheran seminaries. "I had been eager to help this newly-combined organization to flourish," she said. "However, given the longstanding, historic divisions between the predecessor schools and what I believe to have been a politically based whisper campaign against me and other members of the board, it became clear that certain parts of the organization were not going to stand behind me and that I could not be effective as president. I have been scapegoated by an historically divided institution resistant to unification, and have been given little chance to respond to the accusations against me.""
'via Blog this'
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GJ - Gettysburg was the original seminary - the General Synod. When that group became too anti-Lutheran, about half split off to form the General Council and establish its own seminary in Philadelphia.
Ironically, the General Synod came from the Pietism of Halle and that ideology led to the split. WELS also came from Pietism and returned to it via Fuller Seminary.
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| Bergandoff was an icon of the Augustana Synod, Augustana College, and higher education. He wanted the Midwestern seminaries merged at the U. of Chicago campus, which did take place but failed slowly in the decades following. |
Conrad Bergendoff wanted the two seminaries united, and plans were made to do that in the LCA merger of 1962. However, that plan collapsed even though land was already purchased for the merger.
That division was always mentioned with some bitterness, even into the 1980s, so it is no surprise that it is still felt decades after that. I was told, "It is offensive to suggest that a Pennsylvania pastor is from the other seminary, so it is better to start by saying - where did you graduate?"
The reactions to Theresa Latini were so hysterical that some began wondering about Union and Harvard taking "tainted" students from United to finish their seminary degrees at those even-more-Left-wing institutions. The idea is to get Lutheran prerequisites done at an ELCA seminary (Do you hate Luther? Yes? Good. We can ordain you.) to be buffed and polished at Harvard or Union. (Are you an atheist? Yes? Good, you can graduate from our hallowed halls.)
Lutheran seminary education is truly pathetic these days, and I am including the anti-Lutheran ones in the ELS, WELS, and LCMS. The micro-mini ones are jokes not worth mentioning.
