• By RJ Walters, Editor •Summer break is still a few weeks away, but it’s already time for clergy to start talking about going back to school again — as in heading to the annual Michigan Area School for Pastoral Ministry.
Michigan Area pastors (and their friends and colleagues of any denomination) will have an opportunity to learn, laugh and reflect on their ministries when renowned Christian leaders and authors Brian McLaren and Dr. Allen Dwight Callahan convene at the Kellogg Center at Michigan State University on Aug. 16-18.
McLaren and Callahan will explore the theme “Singing the Lord’s Song in a Strange Land” through an in-depth look at theology, best church practices and the realities of the 21st century church worldwide.
McLaren was named one of “The 25 Most Influential Evangelicals in America” by Time Magazine in 2005 and his latest book Naked Spirituality offers new biblical models for how people understand the central ideas of a faith that provides hope for restoring and reinvigorating people and communities through the gospels.
McLaren said he “absolutely loves” the theme of the School for Pastoral Ministry and his teachings will lean heavily on work he’s done in his books Naked Spirituality, Finding Our Way Again and A New Kind of Christianity.
“Although I haven't firmed up plans for the talks yet, the theme stimulates my creativity in directions like these: Christian faith as song, Christian ministry as singing (and) today's world as a strange land,” McLaren said in an e-mail during a recent trip to Europe.
McLaren is often referred to as a leader of “emergent church” movement, which is attempting to reinvigorate Christianity in a “postmodern” world.
He said the biggest problems the Methodist Church faces are not unique to the denomination: the issues of clarifying the church’s message and mission and recalibrating its methods appropriately in light of a rapidly changing spiritual landscape.
“(John) Wesley's example is downright inspiring for us at this moment — developing innovative parallel structures to promote spiritual formation, the dissemination of ‘methods’ via easily scalable networks, seeing ministry happen ‘in open air’ and not just in church buildings, and so on,” he said. “Some of the structures Wesley set up to solve problems in his day are now somewhat problematic…new problems and conditions have arisen as well.”
“So I think we need to ask, not WDWD (what did Wesley do?), but WWWD (what would Wesley do?).”
Dr. Callahan is a respected New Testament scholar, professor, preacher and a writer for Religion and Ethics Weekly.
He is a featured scholar on the television documentaries From Jesus to Christ, The Roman Empire in the First Century, and Portrait of a Radical: The Jesus Movement , and is a commentator in two documentaries on contemporary politics and spirituality, A Crisis of Faith and State of the Union.
He also authored The Talking Book: African Americans and the Bible, a text McLaren said has some “powerful conclusions” that he would have loved to have stumbled upon before writing his book A New Kind of Christianity.
While the School for Pastoral Ministry is focused on providing a form of continuing education for pastors, it is also intentionally set in a natural setting conducive to renewal and restoration.
School for Pastoral Ministry planners hope participants will find the walking trail, screened porches,
babbling brook and outdoor patios superb for meaningful devotion and collegial fellowship.
To make a reservation online go to www.kelloggcenter.com, select
“Accommodations”, and then select “Reservations”. Enter an arrival and departure date and select "click here for special rates". “Enter MAS081511” into Group Code and then select “check availability.”
Check out www.detroitconference.org for more information.
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