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 TI 813: In-Service Seminar: Pastoral Care
  Foundational principles and practices in caring for congregants and community members will be addressed in this seminar. Setting of appropriate boundaries will be explored here as well. Online course (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TI 814: In-Service Seminar: Pastor as Spiritual Guide, Counselor, Coach
  This seminar explores the different roles and responsibilities a pastor must nurture in order to minister effectively with parishioners. Strategies for maintaining role consistency and setting appropriate boundaries will be studied. Online course (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TI 815: Leading From Within: Nurturing Spiritual Leadership in Self and Congregation
  This seminar explores principles and strategies essential for effective leadership in the congregation. Leadership will be explored as a spiritual practice that requires attention to one's spiritual formation in order to be an effective practitioner. Online course (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TI 816: Conflict Transformation
  Conflict in local church life is inevitable. In this seminar, participants will learn strategies for dealing with conflict in ways that can be life-giving for self and community. Online course (Clusters 2 and 3)
• STH TI 817: Mission and Outreach for the Local Congregation
  This seminar examines theological foundations for engaging the congregation in the wider community and explore strategies for helping local churches participate in such engagement. Online course
• STH TI 818: Pastor as Public Theologian
  Pastors need to develop skills in critically reflecting upon and addressing current issues present in the surrounding culture. This seminar will help participants identify these skills and explore strategies for guiding congregations in connecting their beliefs with practice in the world around them. Online course
• STH TI 819: Ministry Administration
  This seminar will explore theologies of administration and explore practices for addressing the administrative needs of local congregations.
• STH TI 820: Local Sacrament
  
• STH TJ 910: Proseminar in Practical Theology
  This doctoral seminar for practical theology majors introduces the primary changes that are under way in practical theology as a discipline, reviews the methodologies upon which these changes are based, and examines the implications of these changes.
• STH TJ 940: Ecclesiology
  This course asks the question, "What is the church?" in dialogue with Christian theological figures and schools representing Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Orthodox Christian traditions. While one of the aims of this course is that students be conversant with those voices, it ultimately aims at the student's ability to articulate the ecclesiology of his or her own community and to bring that to bear on the contemporary situation and particular problems of Christian practice in church and society.
• STH TJ 976: Advanced Research in Practical Theology
  In this advanced research seminar, students will explore a range of practical theology research to map the field. They will analyze the purposes, practices, and significance of this research for the field of practical theology and for the larger human community. Students will have opportunities to develop expertise with selected research tools; develop a significant research question of high personal interest; and conduct a research project that contributes to the literature and some part of the human or ecological community.
• STH TM 815: Christian Mission
  Exploration of biblical, historical, theological, political, and cultural perspectives on the world mission of the church. This course is a requirement for United Methodist MDiv students pursuing ordination in the United Methodist Church. (Clusters 1 and 3)
• STH TM 835: Asian Christianity
  This course explores the dynamism, co-option, stagnation and renewal of East Asian Christianity throughout its history--from the 7th century to the 21st. Special attention is given to Christianity's complex interaction with the religious, political, and social realities of Japan, China, and Korea. Students are introduced to important Christian leaders and movements across the centuries, and they investigate the implications of East Asian Christianity's recent expansion both at home and abroad. (Clusters 1 and 2)
• STH TM 856: Women in World Christianity: Histories, Lives, Issues
  This course explores the history of women in the Christian movement from the early centuries to the present, with particular focus on women in global context from the 19th to 21st centuries. Starting with the reality that women make up the majority of Christians in the world, the course explores texts and sources for researching women's history, including hagiographies and biographies, spiritual and theological writings by women, women's mission literature, and gender analysis. The historic leadership roles of women as sisters, deaconesses, evangelists, missionaries, pastors, and social reformers will be examined. Selected issues for contemporary reflection include church controversies over women's leadership, women in evangelical/Pentecostal churches, and gendered social movements. (Clusters 1 and 2)
• STH TM 857: Global Development and Faith
  The academic study of development often overlaps with the practical application of mission and outreach activities (Churches may participate in efforts to reduce malaria mortality, for example.). Along the way, though, keen theological analysis and critical cultural perspectives may get lost, resulting in misunderstandings and missed opportunities. This course aims to equip reflective practitioners with background and insights they will need to effect more holistic social transformation. (Cluster 2 or 3)
• STH TM 863: African Christianity: Narratives, Beliefs, and Practices
  This course examines the history of Christianity in Africa, with focus on the 19th-21st centuries. It pays particular attention to themes in African theology, gender and social action, environmentalism, Pentecostal spiritualities, African missions, and church/state relations-- including issues of colonialism and democratization. A highlight of the course will be a conference on African Christian Biography with leading scholars, in late October. (Clusters 1 and 2)
• STH TM 909: Mission and Outreach: Foundations for Transformation
  Online Course: This course surveys the biblical, historical, theological, and contextual foundations of transformational Christian mission, and introduces contemporary missional issues and practices. Participants will analyze the mission potential of their ministry site and community. The final project of the course is the development of a leadership plan for mission and outreach.
• STH TM 910: Seminar in World Christianity and Mission History
  A seminar in the history of Christian missions, from the early church to the present. Issues of historiography, method, and the emergence of non-western church history. Required course for doctoral students in mission studies.
• STH TM 930: History of Missiology
  Seminar on the classic Protestant mission theorists of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Required for doctoral students in mission studies.
• STH TM 931: Readings in Contemporary Missiology
  Readings and discussions of important works in missiology from the 1960's to the present. This course begins where TM 930 ends. Required for doctoral students in mission studies

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