Course Schedule

Este curso examina las dinámicas de identidad social, pureza y pertenencia en textos bíblicos clave, particularmente del período postexílico. El estudiante explorará cómo los procesos de etnicización, la delimitación de fronteras comunitarias y la continua construcción de la comunidad moldearon la imaginación social y teológica del período bíblico postexílico, dando lugar tanto a visiones excluyentes de pureza comunitaria como a voces proféticas que insisten en una inclusión radical y una pertenencia basada en el pacto.
A través de una interpretación bíblica cercana y reflexión teológica, el curso pone estos debates antiguos en diálogo con realidades contemporáneas, incluyendo la migración forzada, el nacionalismo y el resurgimiento de narrativas cristianas excluyentes. Se prestará especial atención a cómo las voces dentro de la Biblia Hebrea / Antiguo Testamento y la posterior tradición del Evangelio replantean la hospitalidad, el amor al prójimo y la pertenencia de maneras que desafían los sistemas de exclusión basados en la pureza. El estudiantado también explorará cómo iglesias, organizaciones basadas en la fe y organizaciones comunitarias (FBOs y CBOs) están cultivando contra-narrativas de pertenencia en la vida pública.

This course investigates how the Bible and Christian theology shape, and are reshaped by, contemporary U.S. debates over immigration enforcement, border policy, and the church’s public witness. In the first half of the semester, students will engage with various views of migration theology and the emerging theological motifs that will help students create their own theological voice within the immigration debate. In the second half, students examine the full biblical canon as a contested moral library: Torah teachings on the sojourner and land, prophetic critiques of exploitation, gospel portrayals of displacement and belonging, Acts and the formation of multiethnic communities, and Pauline ethical formation for life together amid political power. The course highlights how Christians appeal to Scripture in sharply different ways, and asks what responsible interpretation requires when the stakes include fear, detention, deportation, family separation, and the vulnerability of mixed-status congregations.

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. Evaluation will be based on seminar participation and leadership, two critical interpretive papers and a final essay constructing a personal hermeneutic. This class is open to M.Div. and other masters degree students, can be leveled up for D.Min. and Ph.D. students.

To be(come) Culturally Responsive requires mentors and partners. Each student in the newly revised Competency Based Doctor of Ministry program will journey alongside a thematic cohort with several DMin students and three mentors. A student’s mentor team of 3 can be geographically centered or spread across the globe. The remote realities that have become the new normal in our world create possibilities for communication and gatherings from anyplace at any time. Year 1 of Berkeley School of Theology’s Culturally Responsive Competency Based DMin will address several themes. Each student will select one of the seven themes to emphasize and build his/her mentor team accordingly.

BST Students must have an approved internship site and mentor/supervisor to engage in supervised ministry praxis experience. This is a core two-part core course requirement for MDIV and MCL degree requirements. Pre-set sessions will meet on Mondays 4:00-6:00pm, subject to change with student group input.

This course will help students maximize the use of technology in their ministry. Students will critically assess where their ministry is in the digital world, strengthen the technological tools they are using already, and then discover new tools for ministry. This course examines the place of technology in ministry. Students will have hands-on learning experience on various methods to use technology and how it can contribute to the effectiveness for ministry.

This course will address theories and practices for effective leadership in an intercultural context. We will consider biblical examples of leadership, the Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership by Kouzes and Posner, and cultural intelligence as building blocks for developing intercultural leadership. Special attention will be paid to biblical and contemporary examples of leadership practices aimed at reconciling cultural dilemmas. Students will be encouraged to reflect on how they have been influenced by significant leaders while creating a plan for their own intercultural leadership development.

Este curso introduce los fundamentos del liderazgo intercultural orientado a formar líderes capaces de servir en comunidades culturalmente diversas, integrando perspectivas bíblicas y contemporáneas, inteligencia cultural y prácticas de reconciliación. Al finalizar el curso, los estudiantes serán capaces de aplicar principios de liderazgo intercultural y promover la inclusión y la reconciliación en sus contextos comunitarios.

This introductory preaching course is designed to enable the students to learn the theoretical and practical elements of contemporary preaching from diverse traditions. There will be lectures, weekly writings, and discussions around topics related to today’s understanding of preaching in ever-changing contexts, and students will preach three sermons for the class.

This course surveys the historical roots of evangelicalism, examines preaching from historical, theological, and homiletical perspectives in both the United States and Korea, and helps students develop strategies to meet the needs of their pastoral ministry, with a focus on the prophetic role, in today’s cultural and ecclesiastical contexts. The class will be taught in Korean in a hybrid, asynchronous-synchronous model: five Zoom sessions and weekly asynchronous engagement. This course will be taught in Korean.

Creative Church & Community, Spirituality & Resilience, Justice & Reconciliation, Border-Crossing. These are all topics that will be addressed through the lenses of Bible, Theology, Ethics, History, and Praxis as a means of introducing and preparing the online student to /for the work of theological study and reflection. In part 1 of this two-part, year-long, MTS core online introduction the student will engage key terms, concepts, and methodologies; in part 2 (spring semester) the student will make application of all of the above to a topic of their own choosing. [This is the only core course for the BST MTS=Master’s in Theological Studies]. NOTE: Students should be prepared to participate in weekly synchronous Zoom sessions to highlight key points from the recorded lectures and facilitate discussions about assignments.

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.

Este curso examina críticamente los desafíos éticos y teológicos que surgen en un mundo marcado por la globalización neoliberal, el racismo estructural, las crisis migratorias y de refugiados, la desigualdad económica y la pobreza, entre otros. Dado que estas realidades afectan de manera desproporcionada a comunidades históricamente marginadas, se busca reflexionar sobre respuestas teológicas comprometidas con la justicia social, la dignidad humana y el cuidado de la creación, orientadas hacia una praxis eclesial liberadora.

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.

This introductory class will consider how worship can contribute to liberation by enacting and embodying feminist, womanist, and other liberative theologies.  We will also ask if worship might need to be liberated from practices and paradigms that are too limiting in today’s world.  This exploration will be rooted in history and theology of Christian worship as well as site visits that include some of the diversity of Christian worship styles.  There will be short reflection papers and site visits, but the primary method for demonstrating learning will be design and implementation of hybrid Monday afternoon worship services at Berkeley School of Theology. 

This course will provide a basic introduction to the study and message of the Old Testament. The successful student will have 1) acquired a socio-cultural and theological overview of the Hebrew Bible with foci on basic content, critical issues, and exegetical and hermeneutical methodologies; as well as 2) developed a self-awareness concerning their/her/his own social location and its relationship to the reading, thinking, and doing of biblical, historical, and theological work; as well as 3) applied methods, theologies, and interpretations to contemporary social justice concerns. This course is for masters-level students. This course will be hybrid format.

This course is dedicated to improving your confidence and skill in critical thinking and academic writing through presentations, discussions, practice, and critique. You’ll learn the difference between uncritical and critical thinking, how to distinguish between info, data, and assertion, how to identify bias, and how to test an argument and evaluate evidence. You’ll learn how to create, support, and conclude an effective argument (thesis), cite sources, and have a chance to practice the many kinds of academic writing which will be required of you in seminary: exegesis, theological essay, exploratory research, personal reflection, and reviews.

Over the course of the next several weeks, together we will grapple with the intellectual qualities, moral convictions, and ethical boundaries that represent Cornel West and his Theo ethical theology which we assert is political theology. Said another way, too often, West is described as a public intellectual. However, we will characterize West as a prophetic intellectual who is informed by his Christian worldview. This helps us explore the intersections between the moral, ethical, and theological discussions, dialogues and debates in the public square.

Jazzin Womanist Expression and The Dancing Mind is a reflective project with resource toolkit for practitioners–educators and learners–to approach the artistry of relational engagement. This course interweaves threads of memoir, jazz improv sounds, artistic briefs to share insights and lessons about thriving amid unpredictable movements in group settings, classes, or public spheres. Can organic learning be facilitated like musical rifts of jazz improv to create justice environments that conjure new ways to teach, learn, and live a jazz life? Students examine a theology of being by crafting creatively subversive models using womanist expression and lived experiences to inspire positive instruments of change.

This course examines issues of morality in society with ethical questions as well as biblical/theological frames that provide a moral basis for public policy. Interactive dialogue and use of audio-visual materials to look at past and present moral challenges will facilitate studentsˇ skill development to assess the ramifications on those least able to protect and defend their own interests. Part of ethical probing is to critically analyze how does the issue of faith and belief in God’s sovereignty get used and abused in the public and ecclesial spheres for ideological agendas when expedient? Students will explore social advocacy groups and ˘watch dogˇ agencies, secular and faith-based. From class dialogue, reading, presentation, and critical analysis paper, students can develop rhetorical arguments and a sustainable plan for praxis in ever-changing religio-political landscapes. Master and Doctoral students welcome .

Using the latest scholarship in the field, this course will do an in-depth study on Racism in America that will include the role that the theology of white supremacy has played in the mistreatment of African Americans, and other minority groups in America.