Avdat

Could Joe Montana beat up Warren Moon? and other theological debates

Megan McArdle defines the phrase winning the cocktail party.

Because I'm headed back to seminary I'm wondering if the rule holds for the classroom as well as the cocktail party.  In other words, despite the presence of so many women in the ranks of clergy and future clergy, does the typical classroom still resemble a pissing contest between the Evangelical Conservatives, the Radically Orthodox, the Future Chaplains, and the Peace and Justice Liberals, or is there any collaboration, consensus-seeking, etc, etc?

I'm wondering what Camassia and Jennifer think, since they have two X chromosomes, and could win an argument with any pretentious male seminarian with one half of their brains tied behind their backs.

High Inquisitors

Mrs. Avdat makes a good point.  Isn't hiring a woman who's not fluent in American Sign Language to lead the NC School of the Deaf a little like appointing Dolores Umbridge to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts?

Plus, she likes to quash student protests!

Tenure has its privileges

Speaking of no one's willingness to accept responsibility for the preparation for ministry process in the PC(USA), it's worth mentioning that the denomination's Office of Examination Services refuses to publicize the pass/fail rate for ordination exams by theological institution.  This is ridiculous.  My son's second grade teacher is more accountable for the academic achievement of her students than John Leith, Stanley Hauerwas, or any Ph.D., tenured professor was/is.

Theological education

NPR's Morning Edition ran an interesting report today about how online education is going mainstream.

My presbytery's Committee on Preparation for Ministry is having a hard time accepting this.  By policy, we refuse to accept online degrees.  This policy was instituted in order to quickly and easily say no to all the jack-legged preachers out there offering an "M.Div." from their Word of Truth Online Bible Universities to anyone with a modem and a credit card.  But we also gladly accept degrees from any of our eleven theological seminaries.

Dubuque Seminary, an ATS-accredited PC(USA) institution, now offers a mostly online M.Div.  2/3 of the work is over the Internet.  1/3 is done in intensive sessions that meet twice a year.

I think that this is a shrewd move for this seminary to make.  Let's face it, Dubuque doesn't have the caché that Princeton has.  Or even that McCormick, nestled in Hyde Park, has.  If you can't recruit folk to Iowa, then go to them.

And I have no doubt that the quality of education will be good.  It's a meat and potatoes curriculum for men and women who are fer sure gonna take their ords and pastor churches.  There are two required preaching classes.  There is a required course in PC(USA) polity.  Ditto "Worship in the Reformed Tradition."  There is a required course in Calvin and the Reformed confessions.  Best of all, there are three required courses in evangelism and mission.  A denomination that's hemorrhaging members needs pastoral leadership with skills in this area. 

A lot of people don't know and would be surprised to learn that many seminaries no longer require much of this stuff for graduation.  As the applicant pool has filled with people who have a general interest in religion, but more tenuous ties to organized religion, much less any prospects for ordained ministry, seminary curricula are increasingly esoteric.  "Ecofeminist Readings of the Succession Narrative" would be a fascinating class to take, but it won't help you pass your ordination exams (unless you hit the jackpot and the exegesis exam that year is on 2 Samuel 13 or 18).  It will be of marginal aid to preaching, Bible Study, confirmation class, and other pastoral duties.

And yet our CPM has only the most grudging acceptance of Dubuque's degree program.  The conversation went like this:

SOMEONE:  Seminary isn't just about the classwork.  It's about the relationships.  Staying up all night with fellow students studying for finals.  Having a beer and a conversation with a professor.

ME:  Just because drunken BS sessions in the dorm were crucial for your ministerial formation, it doesn't have to be that way for everyone.

SOMEONE:  When we were in seminary, a lot of us did internships in inner city churches.  We were exposed to poverty and oppression, and in talking about our experiences, we decided to take action.  We staged a sit-in at city hall. 

ME:  If you want to get arrested in seminary, that's what MoveOn.org is for.

SOMEONE:  But there's just nothing like John Leith staring down at you wagging his finger at you in a seminar.  You just can't have that experience on the Internet.

ME:  (somewhat hysterically)  John Leith is dead!  You can't have that experience anywhere!

I think I had the better of it, but I'm biased.

Ministry

I've had a couple of conversations of late in which I've been groping for the right metaphor to describe the kind of ministry for which I was educated versus the kind of ministry in which I am actually engaged.  I think I've settled on this:  going to a mainline Protestant seminary with a heavy emphasis on Liberation Theology is like OCS for the Social Justice Corps.  There you learn strategy and tactics for leading a liberation community of peace and justice in the nonviolent but deadly conflict to establish God's kingdom on earth. 

And then you report for duty--ordination to parish ministry--and find that you have no troops to command.  Or you find that all your troops are too badly shot up to go into battle.

13 years later I still haven't figured out what to do about this gap.  I'm not bitter about it anymore, but I am genuinely perplexed.

Or, to switch metaphors, the yearning in both Liberationist and Radical Orthodoxy circles for a leaner, meaner Christianity to emerge from the ashes of Constantinianism seems to be a variation on a theme that's as old as the "serious" Christians who headed for the desert once the Romans stopped throwing them to the wolves.  If Christianity ought to be something worth dying for, and nobody's dying, then something's wrong with our commitment, our witness, or the permeability of our boundaries vis a vis the world, right? 

Or maybe it's just that our world is a bit more humane than, say, Diocletian's world.  Can't we give the world a little credit for that, instead of casting about for a theology and an ecclesiology that's cranky enough to provoke worldly contempt?

Augustine reconciled the high commitment level of New Testament Christianity with the low threshold of Constantinian Christianity by holding the clergy to a higher standard than the nominally Christian laity.  And to some extent, this two-tiered commitment level remains intact. 

In some ways, both Liberationists and the "Radically Orthodox" seems to be about the business of reinventing congregations as high commitment communities who relate to a secular society as monastic communities related to a Constantinian society.  But the ethos of congregations remains firmly low commitment, with a fairly low threshold for entry, and fairly low expectations of its members.

And that clash of expectations between clergy trained as I have been and the laity who've been enculturated as they have been is a tough one to adjudicate.

They get letters

I'm not sure why I felt compelled to write a letter-to-the-editor about school uniforms.  Maybe it's the way that "constitutional rights" keep getting dumbed down.  At any rate, here it is:

Regarding Eric Loftin's Aug. 30 letter about school uniforms, it's worth remembering that lots of adults wear uniforms as well. We recognize the soldier by her fatigues, the priest by his collar, the doctor by her white coat, and the banker by his suit. Blue collar workers, too. The blue work shirt with one's name embroidered on it is standard attire for many HVAC technicians, auto mechanics and plumbers.

In these cases, the uniform denotes competence in certain fields of study, and a commitment to the profession's standards of excellence.

So it is with school uniforms. The boys and girls who wear uniforms proclaim that they are about the task of acquiring the wisdom and skills needed to be good citizens and competitive workers in a global economy.

Just how do uniforms infringe on students' constitutional rights? One might argue that a uniform curtails "freedom of expression," but such "freedom" as children and teens understand it usually means thoughtless conformity to what the media defines as cool. We do our children a favor by sparing them from such manipulation. Uniforms do not restrict the real right to freedom of expression: to worship or not, and to formulate a political philosophy and act on it. At any rate, children in uniforms aren't any more tyrannized than their parents, who may be "forced" to wear surgical scrubs or a coat and tie to work every day.

Our sons attend elementary schools where uniforms are mandatory. The children look sharp. My wife and I appreciate not having to battle our boys about what they're going to wear when they leave the house. I wish that the uniforms extended into high school, where gang insignias and skimpy attire are a real distraction from learning. In short, what Loftin fears, I look forward to.

— Marvin Lindsay

Salisbury

Bewitched

I see that a local theological seminary has invited Ann Coulter to speak.  I'm so glad I'm Presbyterian.  Our seminary students get to hear from whacked out women who ride on real broomsticks, not metaphorical ones.  And I'll bet Starhawk didn't charge $50 per head!

History and Heilgeschichte

It's interesting, if you think about it.  In Western Civ. the Persians are the bad guys.  "Behold!  Oriental despotism sets sail to strangle European democracy in the crib!"  But in Old Testament Survey, the Persians are the good guys.  "I have aroused Cyrus in righteousness.  He shall build my city and set my exiles free."

Breaking News: Not All Republicans Are Philistines

Alterman's Liberals for Huckabee Fan Club might just be the kiss of death for the Arkansas politician and Presidential candidate, but this quote is worth spreading around, regardless:

There's one issue I want to touch on. A key element of education is music and art education. It's not expendable, extracurricular or extraneous. The future economy of America is going to be a creative economy. I am very passionate about it. Math, science and language scores improve dramatically when the student has music skills. Spatial reasoning is enhanced by music instructions. It is who we are. It defines us as a culture and a civilization. Very few people my age are still playing tackle football, but I'm still playing bass guitar in a rock-and-roll band.

An Ounce of Prevention; Unintended Consequences, and Other Old Sayings

We heard an interesting talk last night about the work of Barium Springs Children's Home in nearby Statesville.  Once upon a time it was an orphanage.  Now, like most orphanages, it provides short term residential services for children with behavioral problems stemming from a home environment of abuse or neglect.  The goal is to treat them and reintegrate them into their family or origin whenever possible. 

Two rather maddening facts stand out:

1. It costs $96,000 to house and treat one child at Barium Springs for a year.  Imagine what one of our schools could do with an extra hundred grand or so.  When the County Commissioners say, "We can't afford such and such," we really need to say, "We can't afford not to."  It's like the Fram oil filter commercial:  "Pay me now or pay me later."
2. Barium Springs has a hard time telling success stories or even finding out if there are success stories because of HIPAA regulations.  After a child leaves their facility, Barium Springs cannot contact the child because to do so would violate the child's privacy rights, as the law now defines it.  Clearly this is an unintended consequence that needs to be addressed.  How can Barium Springs effectively treat their clients if they cannot collect any long term data on them?  Imagine going to an oncologist for chemotherapy, and that oncologist being barred from contacting you after your treatments had concluded.  This needs to be fixed.  Write your Congressman.