DESCRIPTION: This is a doctoral seminar open to a limited number of masters' level students by permission of the professor. The course will explore the relationship between preaching and the arts. It will review literature relating to the philosophy of art and aesthetics, theology and the arts, creative preaching, and the relationship between preaching and music, drama, and performance. It will provide students the opportunity to preach to their peers, and it will serve as a laboratory for learning to teach homiletics from a creative perspective.

SIGNIFICANCE FOR LIFE AND MINISTRY: While preaching and the teaching of preaching is taught in seminaries across North America, particular attention to the ways in which preaching relates to the arts is rarely addressed. This seminar will help doctoral students acquire the theoretical insight to be able to teach preaching with a sense of aesthetic responsibility.

LEARNING OUTCOMES: The course seeks the following goals for each student: Cognitive: theoretical knowledge relating to preaching and its relationship to the arts; Affective: deepened appreciation for the ways that preaching engages the listener through the use of poetic and dramatic elements; Skills: capacity to craft and deliver a sermon that is scripturally, theologically, and contextually responsible and that demonstrates an awareness of the effect of careful writing and performance on the listener.

COURSE FORMAT: The course will meet weekly for a three-hour session. Students will read and discuss key books, write responses, prepare a lecture on creative preaching, and produce a final project. Assignments will be adjusted for masters' students.

REQUIRED READING:

Philosophy of Art

Suzanne Langer, Philosophy in a New Key (Harvard, 1957), 300 pages. ISBN: 0-674-66503-1, $28.00.

Joseph Margolis, ed., Philosophy Looks at the Arts (Temple University, 1978), select 200 pages. ISBN: 0-87722-439-0, $36.00.

Art and Theology

Samuel Wells, Improvisation: The Drama of Christian Ethics (Brazos, 2004), 200 pages. ISBN: 1-58743-071-1, $21.00.

Jeremy Begbie, Resounding Truth: Christian Wisdom in the World of Music (Baker Academic, 2007), 300 pages. ISBN: 0-8010-2694-4, $21.00.

Preaching as Art

Nora Tubbs Tisdale, Preaching as Local Theology and Folk Art (Fortress, 1997), 150 pages. ISBN: 0-8006-2773-2, $14.25.

Jana Childers, ed., Birthing the Sermon: Women Preachers on the Creative Process (Chalice, 2001), 200 pages. ISBN: 0-8272-0230-X, $27.00.

Clayton J. Schmit, Too Deep for Words: A Theology of Liturgical Expression (Westminster John Knox, 2002), 200 pages. ISBN: 0-664-22392-3, $25.00.

Poetry and Preaching

Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life (Anchor, 1994) 200 pages ISBN:0-385-48001-6, $9.00.

Annie Dillard, The Writing Life (Harper Perennial, 1990) 100 pages ISBN: 0-06-016156-6, $10.00.

Ronald and Debra Reinstra, Worship Words: Discipling Language for Faithful Ministry (Baker Academic, 2009) 250 pages ISBN: 978-0-8010-3616-3, $15.50.

Music and Preaching

Kirk Byron Jones, The Jazz of Preaching (Abingdon, 2004) 100 pages ISBN:0-687-00252-4, $18.00.

Performance, Drama, and Preaching

Jana Childers, Performing the Word (Abingdon, 1998) 150 pages ISBN: 0-687-07423-1, $19.00.

Richard Ward, Speaking from the Heart (Abingdon, 1992), 100 pages. ISBN: 0-687-39166-0, $17.00.

Jana Childers and Clayton J. Schmit, Performance and Preaching: Bringing the Sermon to Life (Baker, 2008). 200 pages. ISBN: 978-0-8010-3613-2, $18.00.