Adapted from a Bexley Seabury announcement
Bexley Seabury has announced a Diaconal Enrichment Program designed to supplement and build upon diocesan training programs. The program is for persons preparing for ordination to the permanent diaconate and for currently ordained deacons seeking to enrich their ministries.
The program offers a low-residency, graduate-level, five-course curriculum that focuses on developing theological understanding and ministry skills most essential to deacons serving in the Episcopal Church.
Fundamental to the program is the course “Baptismal Ecclesiology,” which is devoted to the deacon’s unique place in the ministry of all the baptized. Additional courses help participants refine their skills in pastoral care, cultural competency, community organizing, and preaching. All the courses are offered in one of two formats — intensive week-long or hybrid weekend — that include both face-to-face and online learning.
Participants may earn a program certificate by completing “Baptismal Ecclesiology” and four additional program courses, which may include one elective. Alternatively, participants may take any individual course. Depending on the recommendation of their dioceses, participants may enroll as auditors, for continuing education credit, or for academic credit.
“The Bexley Seabury Diaconal Enrichment Program grew out of consultations that our faculty initiated with bishops in the course of revamping our Master of Divinity curriculum last spring,” said the Rev. Roger Ferlo, president of Bexley Seabury. “We’re grateful for the bishops’ insights and for the opportunity to help them not only support their priests in training but also their deacons who, more and more, are essential to building vibrant congregations.”
For more information on the program, write to recruiter Jaime Briceno.
