Announcement [Colloquy of seminary students]
On October 29th and 30th, the Plenary Pastoral Conference of the Concordia Lutheran Conference met in Oak Forest, Illinois, in a special Fall Session for the chief purpose of colloquizing our theological students (David and Daniel Mensing) on the material covered in their fourth year of study at our seminary. This annual colloquy or comprehensive oral examination is customarily held in conjunction with our annual Conventions in June; but this past summer the colloquy was postponed to the fall.
The topics included Objective and Subjective Justification, the Means of Grace, Law and Gospel, the Sacrament of Holy Baptism, and the Sacrament of the Altar (The Lord’s Supper). In addition, the Pastoral members of the C. T. E. met with each student individually to discuss his work and progress in preaching (homiletics and sermon preparation, delivery and related matters). After two days of rigorous discussion, conducted chiefly by the chairman of our Committee on Theological Education and its second pastoral member but participated in also by the other pastors present, the Pastoral Conference unanimously recognized that both students had successfully passed their fourth year colloquy. The colloquy, together with the final examinations written by the students at the close of each semester and the final grades issued by their professors, determines whether and to what extent the students have mastered the material content of the courses taken.
We praise and magnify the Lord of the Church for His grace in motivating our students to “study” zealously and diligently to become “workmen that need not to be ashamed” (II Timothy 2:15), so that, at the conclusion of their theological training in our seminary program, they will be fit and prepared to undertake the Pastoral Office and the Ministry of the Word and Sacraments upon the call of the Holy Ghost mediately through one or more of our local congregations (Acts 20:28). To that blessed end we commit both professors and students to the Lord’s gracious keeping, to prosper their work, and to bless abundantly all their faithful labors.
The Rev. Edward J. Worley, Chairman
Committee on Theological Education
Leave a Reply