Fall 2026 – October 12-16 2026
Please note all times listed are in Pacific Time Zone
Have you ever wondered what seminary classes were like? Try a class (or 2 or 3) for FREE!
Join us for Discover BST Week from October 12-16 2026. Each day we are offering 1-2 opportunities where you can experience theological education FREE of charge. The only requirement: you must REGISTER.
The following courses and experiences are available to choose from. Simply follow the instructions, click the button(s), and complete the registration form(s). We can’t wait to see you!
Want to Visit In-Person and Tour Campus?
Make an Appointment with Lia
Come experience Berkeley School of Theology during Discover BST Week! We invite you to step onto our campus, meet our welcoming community, and see firsthand how BST can support your calling and equip you for ministry and leadership. This is your opportunity to ask questions, sit in on classes, and imagine yourself thriving here. We’re excited to meet you and help you discern your next steps.
Lia Rochill
TRY ONE OF THE FOLLOWING CLASSES
MONDAY, 10/12
BST Student Chapel
2:00–2:30 PM via Zoom
Come experience Student Chapel at BST—a time to gather, reflect, and worship together, led by our students. Experience how diverse and liberative approaches to Christian worship come to life in our community.
DM 6078 - Becoming Culturally Responsive
4:30 PM via Zoom
This class session will focus on Victor I. Ezigbo’s The Art of Contextual Theology: Doing Theology in the Era of World Christianity. Ezigbo argues that Christian theology is always shaped by cultural, historical, and social contexts. He explores how Christianity adapts to diverse communities and examines theology as a practice that engages local languages, worldviews, and lived experiences.
LeAnn Snow Flesher
Paul Then and Now (BS-4805)
3:40-6:30pm (Hybrid)
As the first Christian documents, Paul’s letters offer a deep and illuminating insight into the study of Christian origins. Thus, analysis of the writings is essential to understanding the New Testament and the formation of Christianity. This course offers students an investigation into these documents from various interpretive perspectives. Special attention will be given to later Christian (mis)interpretations of Paul and his late Second Temple Jewish context.
Eric Sias
LIEQ 107 - El libro del Apocalipsis: resistencia y victoria
5:10 to 8:00 PM Online Sync (Zoom)
El libro del Apocalipsis ha generado fascinación entre quienes lo leen, con sus imágenes fantásticas de eventos sobrenaturales. Pero más allá de las imágenes, el mensaje es claro: hay que resistir con fe en un mundo injusto. En este ciclo analizaremos el libro del Apocalipsis desde dos lentes: el lente histórico-crítico, con el cual descubriremos la historia detrás del lenguaje apocalíptico, y el lente parenético, con el cual descubriremos el mensaje del libro para nuestro tiempo.
Fabio Colorado
Theology and Ministry in the Age of Migration
2:10-5:00pm Concurrent Hybrid (zoom and in-person)
This course a) explores the diverse patterns of global migration in today’s context and b) discusses why migration should be brought to the center of theological reflection.
Hanna Kang
LIEQ 701 - Familia Denominacional
6:00-9:00 PM Online Sync (Zoom)
Este curso introduce la historia, la gobernanza (política) y las tradiciones de las principales denominaciones cristianas. Los estudiantes explorarán cómo diferentes iglesias organizan la autoridad y el liderazgo, así como los desarrollos históricos y las prácticas espirituales que moldean sus identidades. El curso tiene como objetivo fomentar una comprensión más profunda de la diversidad y la herencia compartida dentro de la fe cristiana.
Lilliana DaValle
TUESDAY, 10/13
RS4257 - Why Cornel West matters: Protecting Democracy and Political Theology
2:10-5:00 PM via Zoom
We will explore Cornel West’s theological ethics as political theology, examining how his Christian worldview shapes his moral, ethical, and theological engagement in the public square. Rather than viewing West simply as a public intellectual, we will consider him as a prophetic intellectual whose faith informs his vision for justice and society.
Joseph Evans
WEDNESDAY, 10/14
Meet the Faculty: Happy Hour at BST
(In-Person Only)
5:00-6:30 PM In Person
Join us for a relaxed evening of conversation, connection, and community with BST faculty!
Current students and prospective students are warmly invited to come hang out, meet our faculty, ask questions, and connect with one another. Enjoy casual conversation and light refreshments in a welcoming BST community setting.
RSVP is highly recommended.
BSRS 4650 - Bible, Culture, Power, and Justice
2:10-5:00 PM via Zoom
This advanced seminar will explore how culture, power, and justice affect the ways we read the Bible will draw on global readings of the Bible as well as intentionally contextual readings from the United States, including womanist, feminist, Asian-American, Latina, Black and other hermeneutical approaches. To deepen our understanding of how all interpretation is contextual, we will also consider readings from the dominant androcentric, North Atlantic strands of history of interpretation and engage ethnography of reading. We will consider and perform biblical interpretation as ethical activity.
Laura Jean Torgerson
OT 1107 - Old Testament Speaks Today
5:10-8:00 PM via Zoom
This course introduces the Old Testament, exploring its cultural, theological, and historical contexts, as well as key interpretive methods. Students will consider how their own social location shapes biblical interpretation and apply these insights to contemporary social justice concerns.
Eric Sias
THURSDAY, 10/15
BST 2026 Fall Lecture
6:30 PM BST Chapel (Hybrid)
Berkeley School of Theology’s Center for Truth, Racial Healing, & Restorative Justice invites you to attend the 2026 Fall Lecture, “Equality rooted in shared identity and vulnerability”
Featured Speaker Rev. Dr. Don Ng
Liderazgo (LIEQ-403)
Lilliana DaValle, 6:00-8:30pm (Online Only)
En este curso los estudiantes podrán adquirir herramientas para ejercer liderazgo pastoral en la iglesia y comunidad. El acercamiento al liderazgo utiliza como base la inteligencia emocional y el pensamiento sistémico. El curso consiste en un estudio de liderazgo contextual y un análisis de seis tipos de liderazgo efectivo.
BSCE 8210 - La Politica de la Pureza y el Evangelio de la Pertenencia
2:10-5:00 PM Online Sync (Zoom)
Este curso examina cómo la identidad, la pureza y la pertenencia moldearon las comunidades bíblicas del período postexílico. A través de una lectura cercana de los textos y la reflexión teológica, exploraremos temas de inclusión, exclusión, hospitalidad y pertenencia, y los pondremos en diálogo con realidades contemporáneas como la migración, el nacionalismo y las narrativas cristianas excluyentes.
FRIDAY, 10/16
Film Premiere & Discussion
2:30-4:00pm Concurrent Hybrid (zoom and in-person: Crouch Room, BST Campus)
Join us for a debut screening of the film, Arc Initiative 2025: The Story Begins. BST’s Arc Initiative helps Asian American congregations and leaders to thrive by engaging stories that form, inform, and transform for the flourishing of their communities and the world, and is made possible through a grant from Lilly Endowment, Inc. Rev. Dr. Lauren Lisa Ng, director of Arc Initiative, will host the screening and engage viewers in a reflective dialogue following the film.
El libro de Job (LIEQ-200)
Fabio Colorado, 5:00-8:00pm (Online Only)
El Libro de Job es uno de los libros más interesantes y complejos del Antiguo Testamento. Escrito hace miles de años, el tema central sigue siendo presente: El sufrimiento. El personaje de Job y sus amigos debaten sobre el sufrimiento y como entender la relación entre sufrimiento y Dios. En este curso exploraremos el libro de Job en su contexto y en el contexto presente: ¿Tiene el libro de Job algo que decir sobre el sufrimiento actual? ¿Tiene el libro de Job una repuesta acerca del sufrimiento? ¿Qué pasa cuando a alguien “bueno” la pasan cosas malas? Todas estas preguntas recibirán nuestra atención a lo largo del curso.
FRIDAY, 9/27
Leading Diversity-Oriented Ministries (FTRS-3350)
10:30am-12:00pm (Hybrid)
As the values of diversity, equity, and inclusion further take hold in the Church in the United States, there will be a greater need for competent intercultural leaders. As with many other examples of effective leadership, leaders of diversity-oriented ministries must practice, preach, and live what they believe about diversity, equity, and inclusion of all kinds of people in keeping with the mission of Christ. The good news about intercultural leadership competencies is that they, through missiological praxis—reflection, self-awareness, shared learning experiences, application, and reflection–are accessible. Therefore, the Leading Diversity-Oriented Ministries Program aims to broaden and strengthen the intercultural competencies of church planters, pastoral leaders, ministry leaders, and higher education professionals. The program has the following objectives: (1) increase participants’ leadership capital; (2) equip them with knowledge, skills, tools, and experience; and (3) build capacity for their ministries to be diversity-oriented.
A. Brian Leander
Lessons from James Baldwin: Life, Love, Lies, Liberation (RS-3158)
12:40-3:30pm (Online Only)
James Baldwin, one of the leading figures of the 20th century, bore passionate witness to the truth about poverty, racism, religion, homophobia, and the struggle for justice in America. Throughout this course, we will read and discuss selected novels, short stories, essays, and video clips from his talks, as well as the documentary “I Am Not Your Negro,” and the movie based on his novel If Beale Street Could Talk. We will absorb the ether of Baldwin’s life—Pentecostalism and his beginnings as a boy preacher, the impact of discrimination, an artist exiled in Paris, the Civil Rights Movement, and Baldwin’s return to America—and see how his searing depictions of the realities forged in slavery and misogyny, Jim Crow laws, and lynching provide an education for understanding their legacies, as well as the urgent need for love and liberation in today’s world. Students will address the complexity of personal questions.
Aidsand Wright-Riggins
For further information or assistance with registration, contact the Director of Admissions, Lia Rochill at lrochill@bst.edu
