Christ As The Foundation Of Seminary Formation

Christ as the Foundation of Seminary Formation is a compilation of essays that address the integration of human formation in seminarians with their spiritual development. Seminaries are communities that reveal Christ to the seminarians and in so doing facilitate the seminarians spiritual and human maturation. These essays carry practical import for all who minister to seminarians. Within them is found methods for mentoring seminarians into true men of communion, men who have matured in affect and prayer by clinging to Christ and entering deeply into the way of formation each seminary offers. To be a good priest, a man must be emotionally mature and spiritually alive. The experts writing in this book will assist in facilitating this goal.

This textbook for introductory spiritual formation courses presents the fundamentals and practices of the discipline. This collection includes presentations by several well-known evangelical scholars including Gordon Johnston, Darrell Bock, Richard Averbeck, Klaus Issler, and others.

"Recent Vatican guidelines for seminary formation call for professional accompaniment of seminarians throughout their formation to become Catholic priests. This book explains in concrete detail how to do this through the entire formation process. Written by a veteran formator at a Roman Catholic seminary, it offers a practical guide to formation advising as a ministry of accompaniment, participation, and evaluation. Formators will also find explanation of the evaluation process with a style sheet and examples of written evaluations. The handbook contains an index and an annotated bibliography on all the major topics a formation advisor comes across"--

"Recent Vatican guidelines for seminary formation call for professional accompaniment of seminarians throughout their formation to become Catholic priests. This book lays out what these seminarians should expect from the entire formation process. Written by a veteran formator at a Roman Catholic seminary, it offers a practical guide to formation advising from the point of view of the men who will experience it. It includes a guide to and an example of the self-evaluation that is part of this process. The book contains an index and an annotated bibliography on the main areas of formation relevant to seminarians"--

The best clerical formation today prepares men to be divinely loved in their humanity. In Configured to Christ: On Spiritual Direction and Clergy Formation, Deacon James Keating shares what makes a priest or deacon peaceful, personally happy, and—to the extent he keeps receiving the love of God in prayer as a man of interiority and sacrament—a minister of God’s love to his people.

The past thirty years have witnessed tremendous societal and ecclesial changes that continue to inform ministry education in the 21st century. In Seminary Formation, Katarina Schuth, OSF, examines the many aspects of theologate-level schools including their structures and missions, organization and leadership, student enrollment, backgrounds of both seminarians and lay students, and the evolution and development of degree programs, including human and spiritual, intellectual and pastoral formation. Seminary Formation also helpfully includes substantial commentaries on Schuth’s research by Ronald Rolheiser, Thomas Walters, Leon M. Hutton, Barbara Reid, and Peter Vaccari. An exploration of the changes in seminaries and schools of theology, with statistical analysis, from 1985 to the present, Seminary Formation anticipates the challenges ahead and considers new directions for the future.

Rooted in the documents of Vatican II, the Program of Priestly Formation offers the normative direction for all seminaries in the United States to meet the challenge of priestly formation in the third millennium. The fifth edition, like it predecessor, was shaped by feedback collected during many seminary visitations. the requirements for priestly formation reflect these informative and significant examinations of the current and future needs of seminary formation. the Program of Priestly Formation stands as the normative guide for seminary formation for the twenty-first century, and it sets the horizon for priestly ministry in the years ahead.

Just as a potter uses a "rib" to exert pressure and give shape to clay vessels spinning on a wheel, so God has used the practice of mentoring to shape leaders from the times of ancient Israel to the modern church. This book provides a theological and historical foundation for the practice, inviting the modern supervisor and seminarian to step into the church's rich heritage of mentors and mentees by offering selected vignettes of these relationships in the lives of such influential leaders as Gregory the Great, St. Augustine, John Newton and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. By tracing out the spiritual formation of some of the most influential leaders in church history, Brian Williams shows how certain patterns of mentoring relationships have been pivotal for the people of God in ages past. He then combines the wisdom of the classical discipline of spiritual direction with the tradespractice of apprenticeship to offer us a practical model for mentoring today. The book concludes with a number of tools, forms, and practical suggestions to help shape and guide this demanding but rewarding practice. The Potter's Rib will challenge experienced pastors and seminary students alike to take seriously the role of mentoring in becoming the pastors they are called to be. Brian A. Williams, a graduate of Regent College, is involved in local ministry in Vancouver, British Columbia.