Type | Private seminary |
---|---|
Established | 2017 |
Religious affiliation | Evangelical Lutheran Church in America |
President | R. Guy Erwin |
Academic staff | 17 [1] |
Students | 331 total, 132 FTE [1] |
Location | , , United States |
Website | unitedlutheranseminary |
United Lutheran Seminary is a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America in Gettysburg and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is one of the seven seminaries of the church. [3] It was created in 2017 when the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia merged.
On September 5, 1826, what is now the oldest Lutheran seminary in the Americas held its first classes with eight students in the small borough of Gettysburg. In 1832, the seminary relocated to Seminary Ridge overlooking Gettysburg, becoming the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg. [4]
In July 1863, the seminary's premises and environs became the stage for the Battle of Gettysburg. Schmucker Hall. the original seminary building, is today a museum dedicated to the battle that took place there, the role of faith in freedom in nineteenth century America, and also Civil War medical practices. Schmucker Hall was the largest fixed field hospital at Gettysburg. [5]
Founded by the Ministerium of Pennsylvania in 1864 to preserve both Lutheran identity and the study of and instruction in the German language, the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia was first located in the Center City District. It relocated to Mount Airy in 1889, a historic site where the first shots of the American Revolution's Battle of Germantown had been fired a century before. [6]
The current school was founded on July 1, 2017, as a consolidation of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg and the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. [7] United Lutheran Seminary continues under the charter of Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg. [8] [9] [10]
The first president of the seminary, Rev. Dr. Theresa F. Latini, a Presbyterian, was announced on April 20, 2017. [11] Latini's previous experience working for OneByOne, an organization that performed "gay conversion", caused significant controversy [12] and she was fired on March 14, 2018. [13] Her departure then revealed a deep history of racism in the institution [14] [15] [16] On May 16, 2018, the seminary board announced the selection of Dr. Richard Green as interim president, beginning June 1. [17] After Green left the institution in late November 2019, the Rev. Dr. Angela Zimmann, who was then the VP of Advancement, served as acting president until the arrival of President Erwin in August was2020. [18]
On June 9, 2020, the seminary board announced the election of the Rev. Dr. R. Guy Erwin as president. Erwin was previously bishop of the Southwest California Synod of the ELCA. He is the first Native American bishop and the first openly gay bishop of that church body. [19]
United Lutheran Seminary is accredited by the Commission on Accrediting of the Association of Theological Schools [20] in the United States and Canada and the [[Middle States Commission on Higher Education. [21]
The following degree programs are approved:
In 1835, Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg welcomed one of the first African Americans to study theology in America, Daniel Alexander Payne, who later became a bishop in the African Methodist Episcopal Church and the first president of Wilberforce University under AME auspices. [22]
A century after its early integration, Gettysburg was also the first among American Lutheran seminaries to grant tenure to a female professor, Dr. Bertha Paulssen. Graduating in 1965 was Elizabeth Platz, the first woman to be ordained (in 1970) by a U.S. Lutheran body. [23]
Following his graduation from the Philadelphia seminary, Franklin Clark Fry was elected to the presidency of the United Lutheran Church, the Lutheran World Federation, and the World Council of Churches. On April 7, 1958, Fry was featured on the cover of TIME. [24]
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) is a mainline Protestant Lutheran church headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The ELCA was officially formed on January 1, 1988, by the merging of three Lutheran church bodies. As of 2022, it has approximately 2.9 million baptized members in 8,640 congregations.
The Lutheran Church in America (LCA) was an American and Canadian Lutheran church body that existed from 1962 to 1987. It was headquartered in New York City and its publishing house was Fortress Press.
Luther Seminary is a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in Saint Paul, Minnesota. It is the largest seminary of the ELCA. It also accepts and educates students of 41 other denominations and traditions. It is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission and the Association of Theological Schools. It also has theological accreditation through the ELCA as well as the United Methodist Church.
The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg was a seminary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. It was one of seven ELCA seminaries, one of the three seminaries in the Eastern Cluster of Lutheran Seminaries, and a member institution of the Washington Theological Consortium. It was founded in 1826 under prominent but controversial theologian and professor Samuel Simon Schmucker (1799-1873) for the recently organized General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in the United States. The seminary was the oldest continuing Lutheran seminary in the United States until it was merged on July 1, 2017, after 189 years of operation, with the nearby and former rival Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia to form the United Lutheran Seminary. The new institution continues to use both campuses.
The Washington Theological Consortium is an ecumenical organization of Christian theological schools and interfaith partners located in Washington, DC, Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Members cooperate to deepen ecumenical unity in theological education and to broaden interfaith dialogue and understanding and to prepare both clergy and laity with skills they need to minister in a diverse church and society. The Consortium is one of the most diverse of its kind in the nation, as it includes Roman and Byzantine Catholic traditions, mainline Protestants, Evangelicals, and Historic Black Divinity schools; with partners in spiritual formation, Jewish, and Islamic education.
Samuel Simon Schmucker was a German-American Lutheran pastor and theologian. He was integral to the founding of the Lutheran church body known as the General Synod, as well as the oldest continuously operating Lutheran seminary and college in North America.
Daniel Alexander Payne was an American bishop, educator, college administrator and author. A major shaper of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), Payne stressed education and preparation of ministers and introduced more order in the church, becoming its sixth bishop and serving for more than four decades (1852–1893) as well as becoming one of the founders of Wilberforce University in Ohio in 1856. In 1863, the AME Church bought the college and chose Payne to lead it; he became the first African-American president of a college in the United States and served in that position until 1877.
Charles Porterfield Krauth was a pastor, theologian and educator in the Lutheran branch of Christianity. He is a leading figure in the revival of the Lutheran Confessions connected to Neo-Lutheranism in the United States.
Rev. Marie C. Jerge is a former bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia (LTSP) was one of eight theological seminaries associated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, the largest Lutheran denomination in North America. It is located on Germantown Avenue in the Mount Airy neighborhood of northwestern Philadelphia. Founded in 1864, it has its roots in the Pennsylvania Ministerium established in 1748 in Philadelphia by Henry Melchior Muhlenberg.
Beale Melanchthon Schmucker was an American Lutheran leader, liturgical scholar and historian.
Herbert W. Chilstrom was an American religious leader, who served as the first Presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). He was re-elected to a four-year term at the 1991 ELCA Churchwide Assembly in Orlando, Florida. He served as bishop of the Minnesota Synod of the Lutheran Church in America, one of the three church bodies which merged to form the ELCA on Jan. 1, 1988.
H. George Anderson was the second Presiding Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America from October 1995 to October 2001. Prior to his term as Presiding Bishop, he was the president of Luther College in Decorah, Iowa and on the faculty of Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary, serving as president from 1970 to 1982.
The Pennsylvania Ministerium was the first Lutheran church body in North America. With the encouragement of Henry Melchior Muhlenberg (1711–1787), the Ministerium was founded at a Church Conference of Lutheran clergy on August 26, 1748. The group was known as the "German Evangelical Lutheran Ministerium of North America" until 1792, when it adopted the name "German Evangelical Lutheran Ministerium of Pennsylvania and Adjacent States".
The Evangelical Lutheran General Synod of the United States of America, commonly known as the General Synod, was a historical Lutheran denomination in the United States. Established in 1820, it was the first national Lutheran body to be formed in the U.S. and by 1918 had become the third largest Lutheran group in the nation. In 1918, the General Synod merged with other Lutheran denominations to create the United Lutheran Church in America. Both the General Synod and the United Lutheran Church are predecessor bodies to the contemporary Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.
Charles Frederick Schaeffer was a Lutheran clergyman of the United States.
R. Guy Erwin (Osage) is an American Lutheran bishop. He was elected in 2013 to a six-year term as bishop of the Southwest California Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). Since August 2020, he has served as president of the United Lutheran Seminary in Philadelphia.
Elizabeth Amy Eaton is the fourth Presiding Bishop, and the first female Presiding Bishop, of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). She was first elected to this post in 2013 and was re-elected for a second term in 2019. Prior to becoming presiding bishop, she served as bishop of the Northeastern Ohio Synod.
April Ulring Larson is an American retired Lutheran bishop. In 1992, she became the first woman to be elected to serve as a bishop by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).