Laity and Clergy Learn Together in Upstate NY
It’s a list of courses that would make a straight-A seminarian salivate, an embarrassment of theological riches that would—and does—make many pastors want to go back to school: “The Inclusive Congregation: Ministering to Children with Disabilities.” “Going Beyond Church Walls: Becoming Agents of Peace and Justice.” “The Compassionate Way of Vincent Van Gogh and Henri Nouwen.”
The list includes Biblical studies on the Pentateuch and on Matthew. Preaching courses on Isaiah and on everyday life in Biblical times. Classes on practical aspects of ministry ranging from the church and its money to boundary awareness, from how to use Power Point to creating healthy clergy families. Even quirky offerings such as “Theology of Disney” and an outdoor retreat called “Canoeing Through Creation.”
But this particular curriculum isn’t being offered in a seminary or divinity school. It’s not part of a college religion department. Instead, it’s just a small sample of current and recent courses offered by the Capital Region Theological Center, a nonprofit ecumenical organization that provides educational opportunities and support for clergy and laity in the Albany region of upstate New York.
Launched in 2002, the CRTC was originally established to provide basic theological education for lay pastors who serve the area’s many small, rural congregations that cannot afford ordained leadership. Locally, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Reformed Church in America, and the United Church of Christ had each been providing such instruction for their respective lay pastors for years. But after the four denominations entered into full communion with each other in a historic “Formula of Agreement” in 1997, local denominational officials agreed to pool their resources and create one combined stronger educational program.
With the addition of a Sustaining Pastoral Excellence grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. via the Upstate New York Synod of the ELCA in 2003, CRTC expanded its mission to also provide classes for ordained clergy in the region.
“Although we are not a seminary or a degree granting program, we do try to help pastors and lay leaders develop the strong, sustaining spiritual foundation and practice that they will need for good, faithful, long-term ministry,” says Mary Lou Hammer, CRTC executive director
From a modest start with three classes for laity in 2002, CRTC has grown dramatically and now offers more than 20 classes a year for both clergy and laity. Over the past five years, the program has held 84 courses on a diverse spectrum of topics, with about 1900 enrollments from 800 individual clergy and lay leaders—far exceeding the program’s original goal of 200 participants in the first five years.
Hammer says CRTC’s ecumenical nature and its availability to both clergy and laity have been essential to the program’s success. Though CRTC was founded by the four “Formula of Agreement” denominations, the courses have always been open to students from other traditions as well. Over the past five years, the program has drawn students from 18 denominations, as well as those of different faiths and those who claim no church affiliation.
Likewise, all courses—whether officially listed as part of CRTC’s Lay Theological Program or the SPE Program curriculum—are open to both clergy and laity. Most have a healthy mix of students from both groups.
“It’s become increasingly clear to us that sustaining pastoral excellence is bolstered not only by the softening of ecumenical lines but also by the softening of lines between ordained clergy and lay leaders,” says Hammer.
The Rev. Laurie Carson-Nelson has twice participated in CRTC’s “Canoeing Through Creation” retreat and readily agrees. In the small-group retreat, participants spend four days, paddling and camping on New York’s Long Lake-Tupper Lake canoe route, worshipping, studying, and reflecting together on the care of Creation. Both retreats she attended, in September 2006 and again in September 2007, were immeasurably enriched by having a mix of clergy and laity, says Carson-Nelson.
“It was really helpful to have both lay leaders and pastors because when pastors get together, they can fall into speaking their own language,” says Carson-Nelson, pastor of St. John’s Evangelical Lutheran Church in Akron, N.Y. “Having laypeople who don’t use that same language, though, forces pastors to think about what they really mean and what they are trying to say.”
As the group paddled along, the participants, both lay and clergy, talked with one another about the day’s readings and how their faith shapes how they are to care for Creation.
“That’s not a concern just for pastors,” says Carson-Nelson. “The lay people would usually ask different questions and have different concerns than I did, and that always helped me think about how I could articulate these issues to my congregation. They helped make me more aware of the questions that people in my church might ask.”
Similarly, Margot Phillips, an active UCC lay leader who has attended three CRTC courses, says the experience deepened and enriched her understanding of clergy and the work they perform. A member of the United Church of Christ, Phillips has served on various UCC committees, local, state and national.
“The CRTC classes have augmented and expanded my understanding of clergy a great deal,” she says. “When I’m working with clergy on a project and having conversations with them in various arenas, I am better able to understand the theological underpinnings of what they are saying.”
Miranda Rand and Kitt Jackson, commissioned preaching elders in the Reformed Church of America, have each taken more than a dozen CRTC courses. Both praised the ecumenical nature of the program.
“I’m a big fan of ecumenical projects,” says Jackson. “It is something that is close to my heart, to have different churches cooperating and working together.”
Studying with clergy and laity from the four sponsoring denominations, along with Methodists, Baptists, Catholics, Quakers, and others, brings a richness of theological perspectives that would otherwise be unlikely to occur, she says.
CRTC courses are held at locations in and around Albany and upstate New York and are taught by a variety of teachers, including area pastors and counselors, faculty from seminaries and colleges across the northeast and the nation, and others.
Recent presenters have included Gregg Mast of New Brunswick Theological Seminary, New Brunswick, N.J., on “Faith Seeking Understanding: Introduction to Theology;” Miriam Therese Winter of Hartford Seminary, Hartford, Conn., on “Women’s Leadership as Applied Spirituality;” the Rev. Jo Clare Hartsig, chair of National UCC Disabilities Ministries, on “Ministering to Children with Disabilities,” and the Rev. Dr. Dana Horrell, executive director, and the Rev. Roderic Frohman, board chair, the Center for the Congregation in Public Life, Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School, on “Going Beyond Church Walls: Becoming Agents of Peace and Justice.”
With excellent teachers and compelling topics, CRTC is clearly providing scholarly theological sustenance to both clergy and laity throughout upstate New York, deepening their understanding of ministry, says Robert E. Van Vranken of Burnt Hills, N.Y. The program’s benefits, however, extend far beyond the academic, he adds.
A lawyer and United Methodist layman, Van Vranken has taught a Sunday school class for 20 years at Burnt Hills United Methodist Church and preaches occasionally as a relief pastor at a nearby Reformed congregation. He has taken two CRTC courses, one on “Preaching Isaiah” and an introductory Old Testament course on the Pentateuch. Both were “superb,” he says, and taught him much he did not know about the Old Testament and how it is intimately connected with the New.
“I had read the Bible before, but I had never studied it from a scholarly standpoint,” he says. “These classes have lifted so much ignorance from me. They have absolutely increased my knowledge of the Old Testament and what it says and means. It’s helped me understand that a lot of what happens in the New Testament makes no sense unless you know the Old Testament.”
Even more, however, the courses have enriched and renewed his faith.
“I was becoming cynical, spiritually, but these classes have brought me back,” says Van Vranken. “They revitalized my core faith and made it deeper and stronger. That’s been the biggest benefit, one I did not expect. I thought this would be a strictly academic experience, but it has also been a faith experience. I can’t say enough about it.”
