Doctor of Ministry program at McCormick Seminary fosters spiritual, theological growth
Rev. Sara Thiessen of Zwingli United Church of Christ in Belleville, Wisconsin, said she changed considerably as a person after entering McCormick Theological Seminary’s Doctor of Ministry program.
“I’m not the same person I was when I started the DMin program a year ago, because I have been stretched to view my surroundings with complexity and multiculturally,” she said via the seminary’s website. “I feel I am evolving, growing and changing to be the leader in Christ’s church fulfilling a continual call.”
Thiessen’s experienced is right in line with what the program hopes to achieve. The purpose of the DMin program at McCormick is to provide advanced professional study for pastors and church leaders in a community of mutual learning and teaching, the seminary says. It encourages academically rigorous, cross-cultural, and ecumenical inquiry as it nurtures the gifts of women and men for faithful Christian ministry
“I was seeking the opportunity for advance study in an adult learning environment where the interaction between mature practitioners, facilitators, and students alike enables growth in collaboration with one another,” said Rev. Peter Bartlett of Cooke’s-Portmouth United Church of Canada in Kingston, Ontario. “This context is not available everywhere, but I found it at McCormick."
The seminary’s Doctor of Ministry program is designed to foster the spiritual and theological growth of individual students while developing their organizational and analytical skills and understanding. The program’s core values include learning based on context and practice, theological reflection, engagement across cultures and traditions, and personal and congregational or organizational transformation.
In addition to the opportunity to participate in a diverse learning cohort, program members have the chance to take elective courses in a preferred area of concentration. Each aspect of the program emphasizes a collaborative model of learning and ministry and a mode of inquiry that sustains the essential relation between theory and practice.
“My ministry context is broad, diverse, and sometimes unpredictable,” said Rev. Angela Shepherd of the Episcopal Archdiocese of Maryland in Baltimore. “The academic and personal reflection components of the program continually enhance my ability to serve in new ways. The ecumenical setting is a bonus as it helps to be reminded that God comes to people in different ways and all should be respected.”
