Articles

Students link faith, work
Theology degrees used for day jobs

By Marcia Z. Nelson
Special Section [to the Tribune] Education Today
Published September 18, 2005

Getting an MBA would have been a logical choice for Brian Murphy. A 1981 business graduate of the University of Notre Dame, the Chicago resident had begun his career in finance and real estate, then gone into philanthropy, helping organizations raise money.

"The conversations [with prospective donors] got to a very deep, spiritual level," Murphy said. He found himself meeting people from a variety of faith backgrounds and was active at his parish, Old St. Patrick's Church. These experiences pointed him to a new study field.

Murphy, 46, received a master's degree in theology this year from the Catholic Theological Union in Hyde Park. When Francis W. Parker School hired him four years ago as director of development, the independent school appreciated that he was studying theology.

While the theology degree isn't explicitly related to his day job, it's highly relevant to his life as a whole. "How I try to occupy space in the world is informed by my journey through CTU," Murphy said.

Like Murphy, people in all kinds of day jobs — lawyers, social workers, dentists, managers--are pursuing graduate-level religious studies at seminaries and divinity schools. Enrollment at theological schools has increased more than 9 percent over the past five years, even while the number of graduates going into traditional congregational ministry declined.

Preparation for life
Several factors are at work. Some older graduate theological students are changing careers, and are studying theology to prepare themselves for jobs in other fields. Also, younger students who see who they are and what they do as formed by religious tradition are seeking degrees that jibe with that mind-set. In response, religious denominations are rethinking what advanced religious studies equip one to do in a diverse and secular culture, and so are broadening their offerings.

Nearly half of students at the Catholic Theological Union, for instance, are lay people seeking ways to learn Catholicism deeply and practice it in their daily lives. Many of them are younger people looking for education about Catholicism as well as vocational reflection.

"There's a kind of reaction on the part of some young people, a lot of reaction to what they see as too flat a view of life, a reaction to materialism and a hungering for deeper spiritual values," said Rev. Donald Senior, CTU president.

A premium on learning
Judaism has always emphasized lifelong learning, said Howard A. Sulkin, president of Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies in Chicago. And these days Sulkin notes a slight increase in the number of students pursuing learning for learning's sake.

One Spertus distance-learning student, periodontist Arnold Binderman of Maryland, said knowing more about Jewish philosophy and ethics has sensitized him to his patients' pain and prompted him to expand the treatments he offers.

In response to graduate students asking, "What will I do with my life in light of my faith?" theology schools are developing new answers. Like many schools, Duke Divinity School offers a dual master's degree in divinity and social work. Students enroll in a four-year program at Duke and at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and are then qualified to do both ministry and social work. Begun last year, the program has attracted students training for their first career.

Social work has been an interest of many students pursuing a graduate theological education. Less common are programs that combine religious studies with professions such as law. Louisville (Ky.) Presbyterian Theological Seminary offers a master's of divinity and law, in tandem with the Brandeis School of Law at the University of Louisville. At the Santa Ana, Calif., campus of Trinity International University in Deerfield, students can combine a law degree with a master's degree in communication and culture or in bioethics.

North Park University in Chicago offers a number of combinations of seminary and business specializations, including a business degree in nonprofit management.

Mark Washington, 36, associate dean of seminary admission for North Park Theological Seminary, is a graduate of the school's dual-degree program. He says his job is like that of a marketing executive at a corporation, with a different audience and language but requiring similar skills. "Smaller budget," he added with a laugh.

Terri Hord Owens is drawing on the managerial skills she acquired as an information technology manager in private industry in her new role as dean of students at the University of Chicago Divinity School. She is also an ordained minister in her denomination, Disciples of Christ, and a graduate of Chicago's divinity program.

"I felt a call to ministry but wasn't sure I wanted to pastor a church," said Owens. "What I'm doing now is a great mix of bringing management experience and theological background."

Chicago Theological Seminary, a United Church of Christ seminary, has long had a mission to educate students for jobs within a community, especially in urban settings. "We've been thinking about this for decades and decades," said Alison Buttrick Patton, the seminary's director of admissions and recruitment and an ordained minister.

Whether theological training grounds a first or second career or provides deeper knowledge of religious traditions, students are gravitating to a field of study that they say helps them with work and life.

Steven Lipton, 39, of Chicago was "putzing around" with Zen Buddhism a decade ago and ultimately decided to become a more observant Jew. Now, as president of Biotest, a Des Plaines food safety consulting firm, he is studying the relationship between Judaism and food because of his work at the Spertus Institute.

"If you would have told me 10 years ago that I would be getting my master's in Jewish studies I would have said, `Where's Spertus?'" said Lipton. "Now they can't get rid of me."