Courses

The listing of a course description here does not guarantee a course’s being offered in a particular semester. Please refer to the published schedule of classes on the Student Link for confirmation a class is actually being taught and for specific course meeting dates and times.

• STH TC 839: Suffering and Healing
  This course will examine the understanding of human suffering in personal and communal space and explore the possibilities of healing in church and ministry. Through a range of readings, films, case studies, and a church or non-profit organization site visit, students will critically reflect on various conditions of human suffering including sickness, joblessness, homelessness, racial prejudices, immigration issues and others. The course will employ interdisciplinary study methods, from pastoral/practical theology to cultural studies. Building from these experiences and reflections, students will work to develop practical ministries that aim to restore and heal individuals and communities. (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TC 840: Paradigms of Racism, the Ignorance They Hide, and the Harm They Sustain
  Racism is ugly, painful, and seemingly inimical to understanding much less constructive intervention. When it comes to race, people often yell at, talk past, or simply avoid each other. Experiencing frustration, rage, and despair, some fear and may conclude that racism is intractable, even insoluble, while others "know" that racism does not exist. This course offers hope, exploring how groups of people form and defend competing systems of truth (that is, "paradigms") that hide ignorance and sustain harm. By discussing eight "paradigms" of racism and attendant forms of ignorance, we seek to enlarge our understanding as a basis for concrete practical steps that could be taken by different people in different sites. (Cluster 2 or 3)
• STH TC 842: Urban Ministry Models for the 21st Century: Creative Ministry in Context
  This course will examine urban new church starts and congregational restarts that engage in ministry in their settings. Participants will learn tools and methods for contextual analysis and explore models of leadership for 21st century ministry. Most course sessions will occur at urban congregations throughout New England. One particular area of focus will be ways in which global migration has impacted ministry in these settings. (Clusters 2 or 3)
• STH TC 844: Classics in Christian Spirituality
  This course serves as an introduction to the study of Christian spirituality through in-depth reading of selected classics in Christian spirituality as well as secondary source scholarship in the discipline. We will delve into texts by early monastics and visionary medieval mystics; look anew at Protestant hymns and poetry; go deeper into Ignatian discernment; and engage the spiritualities of Latin American liberation theologians and African American women. This interdisciplinary seminar opens up reflection on spirituality and theology; spirituality and history; spirituality, gender, race, and ethnicity; spirituality, poetics, and autobiography; spirituality and ministry; and spiritual practice. Students are encouraged to integrate the material with an eye toward their own spiritual lives and vocations. The course will integrate music, art, and poetry to offer a fuller engagement with spiritual classics. . (Clusters 1 or 3)
• STH TC 845: Parish Preaching
  The central, crucial role of preaching in a parish setting involves engagement with other congregational ministries and with the needs and resources of the larger community. This course is intended as a second level, advanced preaching course, with emphasis on the context of preaching. The course offers multiple opportunities to develop and preach sermons. Attention is given both to regular Sunday preaching and also to particular sermons for various occasions: special events, Stewardship Sunday, funerals and weddings, Advent and Lent, national observances (Fourth of July, Mothers' Day, New Year's, Thanksgiving, other), denominational requirements, and civic addresses. The interactive engagement of the preaching ministry with parish ministry as a whole is the focus of the course. (Cluster 3)
• STH TC 847: Faith and Film
  This course uses the medium of film as an avenue for reflection upon the meaning and truth of the central doctrines of the Christian church as expressed in the historic Apostle's Creed. The course uses a broad cross-section of film genres to open up new and creative windows for understanding and communicating the Christian faith in contemporary culture and also assists the student in thinking critically about film from a Christian theological perspective. (Clusters 1 or 2)
• STH TC 849: Narrative Sermons
  In this course, students will learn approaches to preaching narratively. By the end of the course, students will also begin to integrate their homiletical practice with their own emerging narrative theology of preaching. (Cluster 3)
• STH TC 850: Identity, Preaching, and Leadership in Postcolonial Contexts
  This course provides distinctive postcolonial lenses through which students will explore and examine how persons and communities practice intercultural preaching (alternatively, public speech) and leadership in relation to identities: culture, race, gender/sex, religious traditions, and religious communities. Through investigating various historical sociocultural religious traditions and religious leaders in terms of postcolonialism, class, race and sex/gender, students will critically reflect on challenging conditions of power and authority and engage with the complexities of leadership and preaching. Building on these studies and reflections, students will gain a keen sense of understanding different leadership and preaching practices interculturally, and develop their own approaches for their varied contexts and identities. (Clusters 2 or 3)
• STH TC 851: Preaching and Worship in the African-American Traditions
  This course engages students in historical, theological, and practical study of preaching and worship in the Black Church tradition. Readings in black homiletics and practical theologies of worship introduce students to a variety of approaches for the development and delivery of sermons and for the construction and ministerial leadership of worship within black Christian church contexts. Lectures survey theories of the emergence and development of the Black Church tradition in the United States and the social, political, economic, and cultural contexts that shape contemporary ministerial praxis in black churches. Site visits, guest lectures by practitioners, and examination of audio-visual media will augment the readings and lectures in order to enrich students' appreciation and understanding of the practical nuances of preaching and worship within the diverse experiences of black Christian faith communities. The purpose of the course is to increase students' ministerial capacity through the incorporation of theological and practical wisdom from the Black Church tradition into their own practices of preaching and worship design. (Cluster 2 & 3)
• STH TC 852: Spirituality and Leadership
  Changing times in church and society challenge our understandings about and practices of leadership. This course will examine the nexus of leadership and spirituality. We will examine theories about leadership, both secular and church-based, focus particularly on the systemic nature of leadership. We will also consider the importance of the 'being' of the leader, not just the 'doing'. The quality of a leader's life and work can be significantly enhanced by being supported with spiritual practices. Those spiritual practices may involve the leader as well as individuals and groups with whom the leader engages. Students will be given opportunity to reflect on biblical models of leadership, to explore a leadership in a contemporary setting, as well as to learn, experience, and practice spiritual disciplines for leaders and those with whom they lead. (Cluster 3)
• STH TC 854: Leadership in Times of Change
  Although it sounds like an oxymoron, change is a constant, whether in the context of the individual, the family, the local church, the university, the nation, or the world. How a leader defines, understands and deals with change, both personally and in the leadership setting, is important both for the leader and those in the organization or group. Leadership for change may emerge from anywhere in the group/organization. Exploring theories and practices from both secular and church-based resources, students will seek to deal with these questions such as: What is the nature of change? How does our understanding of God shape our understanding of change? How does our understanding of change shape our understanding of God? Are there healthy ways to lead in times of transition and change? Are there leadership patterns and practices that are counterproductive in times of transition and change? (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TC 857: Spiritual Resources and Disciplines
  An introduction to Christian spiritual practices and traditions. The course explores topics such as prayer, lectio divina, discernment, spiritual guidance, justice, and hospitality, with attention to the importance of spiritual practice as the ground of ministry in diverse contexts. Students will develop their own Rule of Life as part of the work of the course. (Cluster 3)
• STH TC 858: Dismantling White Privilege
  This course will explore issues of racial justice through various lenses: history of "whiteness" and white privilege; evidence of racism throughout the history of the United States as well as currently; biblical and theological grounding; understanding of differences between personal prejudice, multiculturalism, and institutional systems of racism; consideration of ways of dismantling white privilege and power in those personal, institutional, and organizational contexts. While the course will focus primarily on the United States and white privilege and power expressed against African-Americans, Latinos, Asian, and Native Americans, other national & global cultural expressions will also be included and explored. (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TC 861: Theologies of Church Music
  The Church, throughout its history, has sought to clarify its relationship to culture. In particular, is the Church to accommodate its worship to culture or avoid adoption of cultural forms? The relationship of culture and worship will be explored in this course from the angle of the historical Church's use of music. How have the Church's theologians defined the role of music in the Church? What are the most appropriate musical forms for use in the Church? These issues will be examined with an eye to discussing and evaluating contemporary Christian musical expressions. (Clusters 1 and 3)
• STH TC 862: The Liturgical Year
  The historical development of a Christian calendar of both weekly and annual cycles. Descriptions of related liturgical and catechetical customs and contemporary calendar revision. (Cluster 3)
• STH TC 863: Reading and Writing Rites of Passage
  An examination of historical, theological, and pastoral aspects of the occasional offices that address life's passages and crises: birth, adolescence, Christian marriage, sickness and death, and Christian burial. An ecumenical and international approach will be taken in studying both historic and contemporary rites. (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TC 865: Disability and Theology
  This workshop serves as an introduction to disability as it relates to the study of theology and the practices of ministry. The purpose of this workshop is to expose students to people with disabilities through narratives, film clips and a panel discussion to help students think through the theological issues disability raises while developing potential responses to future encounters with people with disabilities. To this end the workshop will first explore the question: "What is disability?" as it has been defined from historic, social and medical perspectives. The workshop will explore disability through a theological lens exploring concepts, such as, creation, theological anthropology, and theodicy while attempting to answer critical theological questions related to disability. The workshop extends the reflection on disability and theology into the practices of ministry. This will involve reflection upon the meaning of welcoming and inclusion, worship and preaching when examined through the lens of disability. Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TC 867: Theology and Popular Culture
  This course places the Christian gospel into dialogue with a variety of expressions of North American popular culture (film, television, art, music, entertainment, sports, etc.) in an effort to understand the complex relationship between the two. The course takes up at with this dialogue against the wider background of the study of religion and popular culture and by exploring the nature of self and transcendence, morality and the spiritual quest as those are constructed and configured within popular culture. The course asks to what extent contemporary expressions of Christian worship, preaching, Ministry, evangelism, and spirituality might better engage popular culture and to what extent these expressions already reflected the values, patterns, and practices of popular culture. (Clusters 1 and 2)
• STH TC 868: Worship in the Anglican and Wesleyan Traditions
  A study of the historical, theological, liturgical, and sociocultural influences which have shaped the worship patterns of the major American denominations claiming a Wesleyan heritage. (Clusters 1 and 3)
• STH TC 869: Prophetic Preaching, Pastoral Ministry, and Social Change
  This course is designed to help students wrestle with several central issues around prophetic preaching in contemporary Christian churches: the relationships of prophetic preaching to the gospel, to the Bible, to the social-political context, and to pastoral ministry generally. Since the course is designed to be a seminar, students will be expected to wrestle with these issues not only in class but also through a sermon and a public message. By the end of the course, students should be able to develop their own vision for prophetic preaching in a way that integrates the above concerns by moving from a specific Biblical text to a sermon as well as a public message in light of a situation. Pre-requisite TC715 Intro to Preaching or its equivalent. (Clusters 2 and 3)

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