Seminaries, like other higher-education institutions, are increasingly offering classes online.
In
the latest mark of that trend, the United Methodist Church's University
Senate decided in January to allow students seeking ordination to get
two-thirds of their master of divinity credits via online courses, up
from the previous requirement of one-third.
(The change only applies to
course work at 14 seminaries with close ties to the Methodist movement,
including Asbury in Kentucky, a pioneer in the movement.)
“We
don’t want United Methodist clergy trained only online, but we have to
do a better job of making classes more accessible. I think this plan
strikes a wonderful balance," said Bishop William H. Willimon, a senate
member and chair of the Methodists’ Commission on Theological Education.
One-hundred
fifteen seminaries and divinity schools in North America offer distance
education courses, according to the Association of Theological Schools.
Fifty-four percent of schools surveyed by the association reported that
more than half of their students commuters, taking courses from a
distance or both.
But
is that a good thing for training for a job that requires regular
contact with real people?
Pastors-in-training are spending less time
together in brick-and-mortar classrooms, dorms and cafeterias.
Two Methodist educators at Duke Divinity School recently, well, duked it out on the school's Call & Response blog.
Some
things are actually better done online, wrote Jason Byassee, a research
fellow at Duke.
Byassee is a member of the Board of Ordained Ministry
in the Western North Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church.
He voted along with the majority to endorse the University Senate's
decision.
Byassee
acknowledged the lament of those who believe "you can’t learn together
without eating together, worshiping together, crying together."
But Byassee said long-distance is, at least sometimes, even better than being there.
There
is little record of the apostle Paul’s face time with his churches, he
said, but plenty from his epistles — written at long distance. And the
fierce debates in letters between Augustine and Jerome provide
"passionate interaction with such a payoff."
"We preserve and treasure this correspondence not because it is
record of face-to-face encounter," he wrote. "We do so because it is
not."
He said online education can actually be better than in person sometimes.
"As
it stands, a student can rush in late to his or her part-time
(divinity) evening course, dash to a seat, not participate at all in
class, and then head home at 10 p.m., drained," Byassee wrote.
"Online,
on the other hand, a student can take a class and be asked directly by
her instructor to contribute on a particular topic," he added. "…
Students can be asked to participate on a blog with one another even
while the professor sleeps. Or the teacher can break students into small
groups and watch all engage with one another simultaneously.…At some
point the technology gets so good it starts to feel irresponsible not to
use it."
More skeptical is Ed Moore, the Duke Clergy Health Initiative’s director of theological education and conference relations.
"Local
congregations are intensely communal, and these are the places most
pastors will be serving," he wrote. "Among the offices a pastor occupies
in her local church is that of translator-in-chief of the sacred
story."
Such
storytelling, "is not limited to the content of preaching and teaching,
but also includes gesture, touch (or not!), eye contact, style of dress,
permeability of conversational boundaries . . . the list could go on,"
he wrote.
"If I’ve
learned to read your true feelings across the table in a seminar of
twelve students by noticing your movements, grimaces and sighs, I’m well
along the way to ministering to Aunt Carrie," or a typical church
member, he wrote. "Can I do the same in even the best on-line learning?"
Not new, still welcomed
Pope
Benedict XVI may not be breaking new ground in saying it's wrong to
blame Jews for the crucifixion of Jesus.
But his comments are still
welcome because of the clout he carries, say those who fight
anti-Semitism.
In a
new book, "Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week," Benedict blames Jesus’ death
on a "temple aristocracy" and supporters of the jailed insurrectionist
Barabbas — who was released when the crowd was given a choice of freeing
him or Jesus. How could the whole people have been present at this moment to clamor for Jesus’ death?" Benedict wrote.
He
echoed Nostra Aetate, a statement of the Second Vatican Council in the
1960s, that "neither all Jews indiscriminately at that time, nor Jews
today, can be charged with the crimes committed during (Jesus’)
passion.…Jews should not be spoken of as rejected or accursed as if this
followed from holy scripture."
Abraham
Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League said in a
statement: "The fact that this Pope is a theologian, and has served as a
defender of the faith, makes this statement from the Holy See that much
more significant for now and for future generations."
The
Rev. James Martin, editor of the Jesuit magazine America, said the pope
was providing a "ringing reaffirmation" of Nostra Aetate.
"A
Vatican Council is the highest teaching authority of the church," he
said. "Now that you have the pope’s reflections underlining it, I don’t
know how much more authoritative you can get."