Community Programming

The mission of Community Programming at United Theological Seminary seeks to sustain religious leaders and serve as a resource of theological inquiry, spiritual formation, and ethical development for the wider community.

We offer exciting courses, workshops, lectures, exhibits, and more throughout the year that include educational opportunities for congregational leaders (both ordained and lay), as well as opportunities for spiritual enrichment and theological exploration. The newly established Academy for Vital Christianity offers longer-term courses designed for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the Christian tradition. Please join us for a program that meets your needs and interests.

Academy for Vital Christianity

• Christianity’s Enduring Life: Contemporary Stories of Diversity, Renewal, and Global Growth, Mary Farrell Bednarowski
• Creating Significant Worship, Arthur Clyde (Alexandria)
• Effective Caregiving, Christie Cozad Neuger
• How the Congregation Can Empower Its Laity, Jean Morris Trumbauer
• Love Songs to Lament: Poetry and the Hebrew Bible, Carolyn Pressler & Pamela Wynn
• Making Sense of Paul in a Global Village, Neil Elliott
• Reading the Prophets in the 21st Century, Richard Weis (Duluth)
• Reimagining the Church for Our Contemporary Time, Eleazar Fernandez (Rochester)
• Understanding the New Testament in Today’s World, Marilyn Salmon (Mankato)
• What does the Bible have to do with Today?, Neil Elliott

Workshops, Lectures, and Programs

• First Divinity, Sam King - October 29; November 5, 12, 19; December 3
• Evenings at the Bigelow: Art and Soul with Susan Deborah (Sam) King - October 19
• Russian Pilgrimage - September 26-October 10
• Evenings at the Bigelow: Art and Soul - Visual Theology: The Role of Art and Faith, with Wilson Yates - September 23
• New Church Planter Discernment Workshop - September 17-18
• Shelter Repertory Dance Theatre - August 3

Please check back for more details and additional events.

Community Programming

FIRST DIVINITY
FRIDAYS - OCT 29; NOV 5, 12, 19; DEC 3
1:00-3:30 PM
Strobel Room (McMillan 209)

Long before the patriarchal religions developed, and for many more centuries, humans worshipped the Goddess, a female figure thought to be the source of all life and the mother to which we return in death. In this workshop we will become acquainted, through art and artifacts, architecture and poetry, with the Neolithic Goddess as she emerged in the cultures of Crete, Greece, Asia Minor, Ireland, and Northern Europe. Through art-making and writing of our own we will work and play at making a connection with her.

• Who is she?
• What does she look like?
• What are her attributes, her endeavors?
• Of what help was she to those who were devoted to her?
• What happened to her? 
• Why do we as Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists in the 21st century know so little of her?
• What would happen to our inner lives, our self-understanding, our individual and communal decision making if we esteemed her even half as much as our forebears did?
• How might she live within us?
• How might she be trying to make herself known in our world?
• How might she guide us in caring for one another and our imperiled planet?

Susan Deborah (Sam) King, M.Div., has taught writing at various institutions in the Minneapolis area, such as the University of Minnesota, SASE, the Write Place, the Loft, and United Theological Seminary. Formerly a Presbyterian minister and psychotherapist, she leads retreats on creativity and spirituality and was founding director of the Literary Witnesses Reading Series at Plymouth Congregational Church in Minneapolis. She also teaches privately and serves as mentor to many emerging poets. Her poems have been widely published in magazines and journals, and she has given readings from her works all over the country. In 2002, she was given a George Family Foundation grant to complete a book of poems about her experience with breast cancer, One Breasted Woman.

Please check back for more details, including cost and registration information.

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EVENINGS AT THE BIGELOW: ART AND SOUL

The Bigelow Chapel at United Theological Seminary embodies in wood, glass, and stone the deep connection between the arts and spirituality. This series explores that link, showcasing the arts as sacred expression through music, literature, visual arts, and performance. Join us for these evenings filled with art and soul as we look at the arts as seen through the lens of spirituality.

WILSON YATES, MARIANNE COMBS, ROBIN M. JENSEN, KIMBERLY VRUDNY
“VISUAL THEOLOGY: THE ROLE OF ART AND FAITH”
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23
7:30 PM

This evening will celebrate the publication of Visual Theology: Forming and Transforming the Community through the Arts, edited by Robin M. Jensen and Kimberly Vrudny, in honor of Wilson Yates and his contributions to the field of theology and the arts. The work of the Religion and the Arts Program at United will also be recognized.

Wilson Yates is emeritus professor of religion, society and the arts and former president at United. He is an ordained pastor in the United Methodist Church with dual standing in the United Church of Christ. He is the editor of the journal ARTS: The Arts in Religious and Theological Studies and the author of several books, including Theological Reflection on the Grotesque in Art and Literature and The Arts in Theological Education.

Fee: $20.00
Students: $10.00
Registration required.
Download registration form

SUSAN DEBORAH (SAM) KING
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 19
7:30 PM

Sam King will give a reading from her fourth book of poems, Bog Orchids. This book celebrates the fragile Maine island community in which King and her family spend their summers. This community has lost many of its members over the last few years and has experienced other difficulties. Losses and challenges can sometimes wear away our defenses, sensitize us to beauty, and deepen our connection between people and with other life forms. This is the theme King explores in her title poem and others throughout the book.

More about Sam King

Fee: $20.00
Students: $10.00
Registration required.
Download registration form

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NEW CHURCH PLANTER DISCERNMENT WORKSHOP
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 17, NOON-8:00 PM
SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 9:00 AM-NOON
Strobel Room (McMillan 209)

FOR LEADERS CONSIDERING A NEW CHURCH START

Is new church planting for me?
Across mainline denominations, there is increasing interest about starting new churches. To accommodate those considering a call to do so, these discernment retreats are offered with the goal of developing a pool of clergy and lay persons who are ready to respond to a call for new church start ministry.

In this workshop:
· Gain greater clarity around how God has wired you.
· Understand your leadership style.
· Learn questions to ask to gain clarity on your call to consider a new church start.
· Connect with successful new church start pastors.
· Align your call, vision and behaviors to starting a church.
· If not church planting, then what?

Workshop Leaders:

Rev. Paul Nickerson
Associate Conference Minister for Evangelism, Vitality, and New Church Starts, Massachusetts

Rev. Kim Saal
Founder of New Church Start, River of Life United Methodist Church, St. Johns, Fla.

Hosted by the Minnesota Conference of the United Church of Christ.

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Shelter Repertory Dance Theatre
Tuesday, August 3
Bigelow Chapel Lawn

Ice Cream Social: 6:45 PM
Free Dance Performance: 7:30 PM

Shelter Repertory Dance Theatre, established in 2001 to mesh the forces of modern movement, sound, costume, and lighting into distinctive, powerful performance experiences, will offer a free performance at United Theological Seminary.

Under the direction of artistic director Kim Neal Nofsinger, Shelter Repertory Dance Theatre will offer a sneak preview of their performance in this year’s Minnesota Fringe Festival. “Raw emotion momentarily captured” best describes Nofsinger's choreography, which runs the gamut of modern dance expression: some works are dramatic, others are whimsical and touching, still others are pure physical exuberance. Yet consistent in the range of this work are the premises that dances are evoked by an understanding of the human condition and art should teach you more about yourself. Nofsinger is a full professor and the director of dance at Middle Tennessee State University. August 3 is National Night Out. Come out to United to meet your neighbors.

Reservations requested. Please contact Renee Flesner at rflesner@unitedseminary.edu or 651.255.6138.

Please bring a blanket or chair(s).

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Seeking the Face of Christ in Russia: An Experiential Pilgrimage
download brochure
download article

September 26-October 10, 2010
Must register by June 30, 2010

United Theological Seminary will again partner with Icon Art Studios, Inc. in a pilgrimage in spiritual formation through study and dialogue with Iconography and art. The pilgrimage, which will be jointly led by Russian and American leaders and features stops in St. Petersburg and Moscow, is designed to build deeper bridges of cultural and spiritual understanding between American Christianity and the Orthodox faith in Holy Russia.

Russian Leaders

Tamara Mikhailova is associate professor at the Smolny Institute of Arts and Sciences in St. Petersburg. Prior to that she lived in America for 10 years, where she taught Russian language, art, literature, and culture at Macalester College in St. Paul and at Kansas University and Miami University in Ohio. Tamara is the author of five books on Russian and British art and has professional associations with The Hermitage, The Russian Museum, and the Vaganova Academy of Ballet.

Nadezhda Kolesnikova is an instructor at St. Petersburg Theological Academy and Seminary, which is on the territory of the St. Alexander Nevsky Monastery (Lavra). She assists in the formation of special opportunities for pilgrimages that seek a deeply interactive journey in the arts, theology, and culture.

Slava Benois-Rogalsky is the Russian director of the Benois Institute, which also partners with academic institutions in France. Mr. Benois-Rogalsky facilitates tour itineraries for the purpose of education and cultural exchange.

American Leaders

Debra Korluka is an internationally renowned artist and Byzantine iconographer. She was the first American to exhibit in the former Soviet Union and has studied with icon masters from the Ukraine and Russia. Korluka teaches workshops at seminaries and also offers instruction from her studio and gallery, www.icon-art-studios.com. Her work, which is displayed in museums around the world, has been commissioned by many churches and private collectors nationally and internationally. Over the years, Korluka has developed many close working relationships with renowned artists, churches, and monasteries in Russia.

Richard Scheerer is an ordained minister of the United Church of Christ and has had a full career in the local church and denominational ministry. His gifts include creating meaningful experiences in inter-cultural encounters and building a sense of community for those on a pilgrimage experience. His specialties are in ecumenical dialogue, spirituality and liturgy, Celtic and orthodox spirituality, and the visual arts; he also dabbles in painting. He is a member of the adjunct faculty at United.

Download the brochure, which includes a complete itinerary.

Download a registration form.

Please call 612.889.5868 for all inquiries.