High Minded Theology Versus the Lives of Lay People

A faculty member in the Catholic setting recently reviewed the separation between Catholic academics who train priests and the changing world of religion. I think it applies not only to the Catholic denomination but to many Protestant ones as well.

I read the link twice and am not certain I understand it completely. The author, a professor of theology, laments several developments taking place.

He laments that students entering seminary studies have less grounding in academic theology than in past generations. But, seminaries are devoting less training in theology than in the past. It's importance has slipped over time.

At the same time outside the seminary there are ever increasing headwinds for the church. Students, he said, are not being trained to move into those headwinds and compete.

The smaller colleges which provided deeper training in the denomination's theological tenets train few students, are becoming smaller and some are closing. Larger Catholic research universities are not set up to train seminary students in Catholic theology but are to train them about it. My own guess it this means professors are required to publish and the easiest thing to publish is an article that splits theological hairs and does nothing to advance the future of the denomination.

He points out that new clergy will be required more than their predecessors to work with lay people. Little training, he says, is being provided for that.

It seems to me Christianity of several stripes, Catholic and Protestant, would help itself by accepting the public does not buy what it is selling like it used to. Instead of trying to sell the old tonic, it should say, "Let's set aside some of our old stuff like homosexual sin, abortion sin and pushing ourselves into laws. Then, let's find common ground with non believers to help the less fortunate."