Windows Summer 2005

AUSTIN PRESBYTERIAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY WINDOWS SUMMER 2005 ENCOUNTERING CHRIST IN OTHER CULTURES LOOKING OUTWARD aybe you have seen, as I have, one of those t-shirts that portrays across one’s chest a big blue picture of the plan- Met as seen from some distant satellite wending its way through the heavens. From off to one side, an arrow is drawn to one tiny point in the midst of that planet, and across the bottom of the scene are written the words, “You are here.” I am both amused and appreciative when I am thus reminded of how large is our world, and how small is our own presence in it. Or maybe it’s a small world after all, as we move around in it with greater ease to ever more distant destinations. Through travel seminars, a growing multicultural presence in our student body, formal relationships with seminaries in other parts of the world, and visitors coming from other lands both to learn and to teach here, Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary is enabling new and profound levels of engagement with both the largeness and the smallness of the world to which we are called to minister in the name of Jesus Christ. Much of this issue of Windows is devoted to exploring specif- ic instances in which, through learning opportunities available President Wardlaw (right) with 2005 Commencement here, we North Americans from the First World have had our per- speaker David McKechnie spectives enlarged by encounters with people from other cultures—either on our turf or theirs—and the transformational differences such instances have made. The net result is that, in the The President’s Preaching and church and in the world, biases are turned upside down, new com- Speaking Engagements mitments are ignited, we and our premature certainties are made July 17-22, Preacher, Presbyterian Association of smaller, and something about the Gospel and its reach is made Musicians Western Worship and Music larger. Conference, Albuquerque Sometimes this happens in Stellenbosch, sometimes it hap- Aug. 7-12, Preacher and Teacher, “A Church for pens in Delhi, sometimes in Debrecen, sometimes in Mexico City. Our Time” Conference, Montreat And sometimes it happens in Austin. Around our dining room Aug. 12-13, Keynote Speaker Presbytery of table a month and a half ago, the Rev. Isaac Banda shared a meal Sheppards and Lapsley, Birmingham, Alabama with me and my family and told us of what he was looking for- Aug. 14, Preacher, Independent PC, Birmingham ward to when he would begin his journey home in a week or two, Aug. 28, Preacher, Trinity PC, McKinney, Texas almost a year from when he came to the Seminary from Katete to work on an additional degree here. Earlier in the evening, we had Sept. 18, Preacher, Grand Avenue PC, Sherman, all stood in the kitchen around an atlas while he pointed out the Texas landmarks of his native Zambia and of his denomination, the Sept. 25, Preacher, First PC, Shreveport Reformed Church of Zambia. Throughout our time around that Sept. 28, Host, Ambassador Forum and table, we reflected on the stark differences between our culture and President’s Colloquium, Austin his, and the implications that those differences have for the way Oct. 9, Preacher, Shandon PC, Columbia, South the faith is proclaimed, and the poverty that is really wealth and Carolina the wealth that is really poverty; and when that evening was over, Oct. 16, Preacher, St. Andrew’s PC, Austin to put it briefly, it was as if the landscape of our churchly universe Oct. 23, Preacher, The Church at Horseshoe Bay, had been rearranged and there was now an arrow pointing to a Horseshoe Bay, Texas new spot where a caption stated, “You are here.” Nov. 6-7, Preacher and Teacher, Lakeview PC, Read on, and see if, in a similar way, this issue makes your New Orleans world smaller and larger, all at once. Nov. 13, Preacher, Westminster PC, Austin Theodore J. Wardlaw Nov. 20, Preacher, First PC, Clinton, South Carolina President CONTENTS BOARD OF TRUSTEES Encountering Christ in other Cultures Elizabeth C. Williams, Chair 2-10 Michael D. Allen 4 Trading spaces Carolyn W. Beaird Teaching in Africa becomes a learning experience Dianne E. Brown James W. Bruce Jr. 5 Trading places F. M. “Mac” Bellingrath III Zambian pastor spends a year as an ecumenical fellow Cassandra Carr 6 Trading graces Peggy L. Clark South African’s presence embodies the faith of Ephesians James G. Cooper Elizabeth Blanton Flowers 7 A passage to India Donald R. Frampton Study trip expands student’s paradigm for dialogue Judye G. Hartman Bruce G. Herlin 9 The church, one and catholic Robert T. Herres Professor Arun Jones on the unity and diversity of the church James R. Hunt J Carter King III 11 The Class of 2005 Catherine O. Lowry John M. McCoy Jr. 16 Community news Blair R. Monie 19 Development news Virginia L. Olszewski William C. Powers Jr. 21 Faculty news Cheryl Covey Ramsey Sydney F. Reding 24 Alumni/ae news Max R. Sherman Back cover Photos from the 2005 commencement Jerry Jay Smith Hugh H. Williamson III Judy A. Woodward WINDOWS Summer 2005 Trustees Emeriti Volume 120 Number 2 Clarence N. Frierson EDITOR Stephen A. Matthews Randal Whittington Edward D. Vickery CONTRIBUTORS John Evans Michael Jinkins Timothy Kubatzky Shannon Neufeld Jeremy Pippin Georgia Smith Prescott Williams Publisher & Mailing Statement Cover photograph by Karolina Wright Windows is published three times each year by Austin Presbyterian Theological The theological schools of the Seminary. Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) ISSN 2056-0556 no longer receive funding from Non-profit bulk mail permit no. 2473 the basic mission budget of the Austin Seminary Windows Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary General Assembly. Churches 100 E. 27th St. are asked to contribute 1% of Austin, TX 78705-5797 Theological Education Fund their operating budgets to the phone: 512-472-6736 (1% Plan) e-mail: [email protected] fund, which is then distributed fax: 512-479-0738 to the seminaries. www.austinseminary.edu encountering Christ in other cultures hat I’ll miss most about Austin Semi- nary,” said senior Jean Reardon near “W the end of her last semester, “is this wonderful sense of community and getting to know people from so many different traditions. And I think most especially of my trip to Zambia, a year ago in January, which widened my view of the church.” Over the years, Austin Seminary has explored a number of different ways of encouraging encounters with the univer- sal church. Currently, there are three significant ways this is achieved: courses in the Master of Divinity curriculum, travel seminars to foreign lands, and an exchange of students and faculty from institutions outside the United States. Through courses such as “The Church in India, “Explor- ing Korean Christianity,” “The Church in Africa, “The Church in Latin America,” and “Worship and Inculturation: Interdisciplinary Investigations,” Mission and Evangelism Professor Arun Jones invites students to explore the riches of Christian presence and witness in a variety of cultures and contexts. These classroom electives open students to the great diversity of Christ’s body, and help them to see ways to engage this diversity in their own lives and ministries, 2 through travel seminars, cross-cultural mission, or spe- Theological College in Zambia, the University of cialized work such as ministry with immigrants or at the Stellenbosch in South Africa, and the Presbyterian Texas-Mexico border. Theological Seminary of Mexico. The primary focus of When Elma Gunther of Dallas, Texas, died in 1986, these relationships is to facilitate an exchange of students leaving $1 million to Austin Seminary in her estate, her and faculty and to encourage collaborative research beneficence created an opportunity for generations of stu- between the institutions. dents to personally touch the world outside their own The Academy of Reformed Theology in Debrecen in experience. With the funds, then-President Jack Stotts eastern Hungary is one of only three places in Hungary created the Gunther Scholarship for cross-cultural travel, where clergy of the Reformed Church of Hungary are making a subsidized international journey available to trained. According to Old Testament Professor Andrew each masters-level student. Now, every January Austin Dearman, “After the fall of the Berlin Wall, the [PC Seminary professors lead study tours to such places as the (USA)] General Assembly urged seminaries to form rela- Middle East, Africa, India, Central America, and Europe. tionships in places formerly behind the Iron Curtain.” In Obviously travel seminars broaden students’ aware- 1991, Dearman, on his way to the Middle East with a ness of the world, but they also embolden their awareness group of Seminary students, met with the administration of God, of scripture, of the life of the church, and of at Debrecen. Following that, a steady flow of students themselves. “I’m not sure there is a better educational from Hungary has made their way to Austin Seminary. activity we provide than the travel seminars,” says Inspired by the Presbyterian Church’s long history of Academic Dean and Professor of Pastoral Theology mission involvement with African churches, this year the Michael Jinkins, who has led several trips to Scotland. “I Seminary formalized an agreement with Justo Mwale have been amazed again and again at the way students Theological College in Lusaka. Part of the Reformed change their own thinking because of their engagement Church in Zambia, Justo Mwale is in the process of with people of faith in other parts of the world. The word adding a masters program in theology, currently not avail- transformation gets used a lot these days, but travel semi- able in Zambia, and Austin Seminary has agreed to serve nars can be transformative for students.

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