There is a real crisis in Christian education, but it’s not the one you might think.
Christians in the USA have long been ambivalent about the education of clergy. The first colleges founded in colonial America were established primarily to educate clergy. But many colonial Americans viewed clergy education as a vestige of European elitism. During the Great Awakening the conflict raged between formally educated clergy who generally opposed the Awakening and clergy who were not formally trained who generally supported it. Jonathan Edwards, the greatest American theologian who was formally trained, resisted elitism and guided the Awakening. His book, The Religious Affections, remains a helpful guide for the formation of renewal in the Church. Don’t miss the point here – it was a formally trained theologian who resisted elitism and offered an enduring defense of renewal movements.
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