Thursday, 13 September 2007
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It's a match made in heaven.
On one side: a pastor who finds neither acceptance from the secular world (which shunts pastors as irrelevant) nor appreciation from his own underpaying church (which makes incessant, meddlesome demands). He flits from church to church, poor and generally not respected. Thus, he needs respect and money and position.
On the other side: floundering seminaries struggling to stay financially afloat in a world of tight budgets and harsher spreadsheets. These seminaries accept (almost indiscriminately) anyone willing to put down the tuition money, no matter what their moral or intellectual character. The cost, after all, of running a seminary is prohibitive. Thus it needs students, students, students.
Welcome to the Doctor of Ministry degree.
After three quick, easy, study-lite years, the pastor has attained his Doctor of Ministry degree. His doctorate degree. That degree gives the pastor a tremendous amount of respect now. He is Dr. Pastor now, a real somebody. More importantly, there is tremendous upside attached to his new title, and the ceiling on his earning potential has just been lifted. Dr. Pastor has clout now, or Dr. Rev. Pastor, if you will.
SuffixSuffice it to say, he has respect, money, and position.Seminaries are all too happy. At minimal cost, the D.Min degree ushers in a wave of new students, and, more importantly, a flood of tuition money from a previously untapped demographic. It is a stroke of marketing genius, cost-saving and profit-ratcheting. Classrooms are sitting empty, just waiting to be filled at no real extra cost. All the facilities, libraries, accommodations just waiting to be filled with these newly-found students chomping at the bit to put down money. A real cash cow for the seminary. And as market-driven as a used-car dealership.
Unfortunately, in this win-win marriage between pastor and seminaries, the losers are the churches. The churches which needs to pay more now to Dr. Pastor. The churches which often foot the tuition bill for a Mickey Mouse degree.
David F. Well, professor at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, in his book No Place for Truth, offers a scathing review from one on the inside.
The direction that this degree has taken since its inception has not been very reassuring, however, and given its genesis, it would be surprising if it had. The quality of D.Min. degrees undoubtedly varies a lot, but there are a substantial number whose academic or intellectual demands are not great. What in many other professions are simply summer courses for updating, refresher courses mandated for continuing certification in the profession but with no significance for any degree, became the royal route that many ministers traveled toward a degree . . . But what draws ministers to these minimalist degrees, and why do seminaries offer them? It strains one’s credulity a little to think it is only a love of learning that has produced this happy match. After all, among those who have graduated with the degree, 78 percent expressed the view that they now expected to be more respected in the community, and 73 percent expected to be paid more. The upshot of it all, in fact, is that some seminaries might have suffered an ignominious demise survived because of the D.Min. degree, and ministers who might have floundered in their careers have now gotten ahead . . . [Indeed], a significant number of faculty still have deep reservations about the degree because of its lack of definition and because of their unease over the financial motives that drive it.
Pastors, of course, always need to be learning and improving on their ministerial skills. That can be done through conferences, workshops, books. A plethora of material and opportunities are out there. But when a minimalist degree is hung out there for financial reasons, and wrung-out pastors flock to it like bees to the hive, one needs to wonder at the what is truly driving the church today.
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Comments (10)
unfortunately, very cutting and very true.
i had a pastor ask me if i got my demon yet. and he talked about how he got his demon and how it empowers his ministry. he urged me to get my own demon degree.
sorry, but i don't want a demon! and i'm definitely going to pay for one!
;)
Hiya Cutter,
This is really interesting. I think that facets of your cirtique are right on, however, your previous post makes me think that you don't really believe any of it.
First, at the beginning you talk about the pastors needs and don't mention God at all. Additionally, you write down all these things that, as far as I can tell, you think the pastor NEEDS.
Secondly, this fits in nicely with your previous posting about how the church should go for the corporate motif because, God knows, the old churchy way didn't work in the world's, or your, eyes.
Thirdly, and somewhat summatively, the quote you gave from Dr. Wells is in a section that decries the professional, worldly attitudes and methods of todays churches and seminaries and Christian leaders. Basically, Dr. Wells is, in that and other sections, taking issue with things the you think the pastor needs and methods of selection and hiring which you postulate would be advantageous.
It really seems that you are just throwing spaghetti against the wall, it sticks, when it falls off you throw some more up there. It really has no meaning and no purpose and you're just well-read and bored.
I agree - to an extent. However, I know pastors who've had to go the D. Min. route because they have a full-time job and family and simply do not have the time/money required to attain a more "acedemic" doctorate. I think seminaries are evil in general. How many guys do I know who have uprooted their families, moved to another city, and lived barely above the poverty line just to get an abbreviation attached to their name?
MMMMMMMMMM Why didn't you tell me four years ago. The academic standard for writing my dissertation matched those of my PhD. In philosphy from UCLA. Oh well, unless you put into it what you believe you should what good is it. A DMin does not generally bring in a larger income nor does it bring status. I remember when owning (and I have) a Mercedes was prestigous. Now friends with Fords have as much. My wife has a PhD in Psychology. Does it bring her higher pay? No, unless she charges more. Value of any degree comes from what is learnded and how it is applied regardless of the greed of the school. Think of all of the MBAs that are handed out from night school now?
The now-deceased Rev. Jerry Falwell used to enjoy all the status his two HONORARY doctoral degrees seemed to confer upon him. His staff as well as his followers still refer to him as "Doctor Falwell." How silly. For someone who dropped out of Lynchburg College and then went on to some "Bible College" he sure milked those honorifics to the hilt. It never ceases to amaze me. Instant respectability can come even to an agnostic bootlegger's son simply by getting a couple of fancy parchment diplomas issued. The institutions granting these honorary degrees don't even matter. What matters is, POOF!....instant Doctor! Instant respectability. Well, at least by the gullible and those easily impressed.
The D.Min. is an earned degree. There will always be diploma mills where you can buy a degree, even a medical doctorate. Many employers and probably even some denominations could care less about WHERE the work, if any was done. The transcript showing a conferred degree is all that matters to some. For others a photocopy of the diploma itself allows one to be 'called' to pastor a church. Seems the lower you go on the religios food chain the less genuine the credentials have to be. From hierarchical churches down to autonomous megachurches or country tentmakers there are generally very different standards for ordinations or calling to pastorates. What would pass for a doctorate in some circles would clearly never be accepted in others.
I am looking into pursuing a D.Min but not because I want to be called "Dr." or get better pay, especially since serving as a church-planting missionary is not a vocation chosen because of its financial bennefits. As for the D.Min being a "easy, study-lite" degree...the same can be said for some M.Div degrees where student are able to do 3.8+ work and sail into a Ph.D program where as in some more adademic rigorous M.Div program they might finish more around the 3.0-3.5 range. Also, the D.Min might be an "easy, study-lite" program if all the student was doing was his/her course work but when trying to do that and maintain full-time minister responsibilities...study-lite might not be as easy as it seems. The bottom line seems to be that whether the student is pursuing an M.A, M.Div, D.Min, or Ph.D, the student gets out of it what is put into the study.
Grace and peace,
Rex
The whole status in education situation seems relative to me. The clergy whom I grew up under all had Bachelor of Divinity degrees from denominational seminaries. Now they are all M. Div. degrees Back in my undergraduate years, Pharmacy degree was a 5 year BS degree. Now it is a PharmD. Ditto for Physical Therapists. Some of this can be blamed on the various professional accreditation agencies who allow this.
However, I did get the D. Min. simply to sharpen my ministry skills, do more structured studies and yes, I did write the long doctoral dissertation [using the handbooks from the PhD programs]. I agree with the sentiment that any degree is what a person puts into it. A "D. Min." is a chance at an "earned" degree. As mentioned above, many famous celebrity Pastors and Evangelists have had honorary doctorates and do like being called, "Dr."
I think is it a bit cynical to call the D. Min. an inferior, lite or fluff degree. Historically in many churches and professions, the pastor or professional was sort of "mentored" by a master in the profession or vocation.
In our denomination's clergy history, students went to seminary until the next opening was avaiable .... due to a smallpox epidemic, American Indian or outlaw shoot-out or just plain desertion from the clergy job due its stress, pressure and poverty that followed. So "graduation" time was determined by the "casualties" out in the Northwest territories. I spent 2 years studying the history of the ethnic communities of our denominational clergy--in my D. Min. program!
"The elephant in room" as far as I can see is that the traditional "move away to go to seminary" method of education is no longer financially sustainable. I know both mainline and conservative [and yes "Bible"] churches who are struggling to pay their bills as well has hang onto a pastor. The D. Min. model might become the wave of the future for the basic pastoral education credentials with time.