wfn.org | LCMS - Seminary Launches Immigrant distance education program

[Worldwide Faith News <wfn@igc.org>]

The Lutheran Church--Missouri Synod
Board for Communication Services

LCMSNews -- No. 73
November 13, 2002

Sem launches immigrant program

A distance-education seminary program for immigrants to the United States 
is expected to be "up and running" in mid-February with some 40 students.

The  Ethnic Immigrant Institute of Theology, based at Concordia Seminary, 
St. Louis, is a specialized, interdisciplinary program that incorporates 
distance education, local mentoring and on-campus training.  It is designed 
to provide "the necessary foundation for competent missional pastoral 
ministry and the process of lifelong learning" for men who are serving as 
missionaries in ethnic-immigrant and urban cultures in North America, 
according to Dr. Andrew Bartelt, the seminary's vice president for academic 
affairs.

Inspiration for the institute came from workers in the Synod's African 
immigrant ministries, and the program was originally intended solely for 
African immigrants, according to Rev. Yohannes Mengsteab, facilitator for 
new African immigrant and urban missions with LCMS World Mission and 
director of the new Ethnic Immigrant Institute.  But students in the 
program will include Africans, Asians and Middle-Easterners who work with 
Muslims.

African-immigrant work in the Synod is modeled on "a missionary strategy," 
Mengsteab said.  "So the missionaries that we have called will work in a 
district and plant multiple ministries.  And they will all have leaders, 
and, in most cases, those leaders are lay people who have been identified 
by their communities as spiritual leaders.  Now these people need training."

While the Synod has more than 70 African-immigrant ministries, the vast 
majority of them are led by laymen -- only 10 African-immigrant leaders are 
ordained, Mengsteab said.  "This institute," he said, "will prepare [the 
laymen] for ordination."

It is, according to Bartelt, "another way of meeting the missional needs of 
the church in a creative, alternative way."

The Ethnic Immigrant Institute differs from the Synod's Distance Education 
Leading to Ordination, or DELTO, program in that courses are tailored more 
to non-American and urban cultures and take into account the often-limited 
educational background of foreign students, Mengsteab said.

But, like DELTO, the institute brings the seminary to the student, allowing 
them to "integrate what they have learned with their day-to-day ministries."

Says Mengsteab: "The Lord is really blessing [the Ethnic Immigrant 
Institute], and I have no doubt it will continue to be blessed."

Applications to the program will be accepted throughout this month.  For 
information, contact Mengsteab at (800) 433-3954, Ext. 1336; 
yohannes.mengsteab@lcms.org.

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