The Lilly Study: Challenge to College and Seminary

Abstract

Pre-Seminary Education' will greatly interest members of the American Academy of Religion. It is an important study. The primary incentive for the project came from a long-standing conviction that much in the preparation of clergymen calls for analysis on an objective basis. In a sense the Report carries on the work so well begun in the study by Niebuhr, Williams, and Gustafson. But the present project was also motivated by a concern which seminary authorities and teachers of religion to undergraduates felt about the relation of collegiate studies in religion to seminary instruction. The changing character of the quality, extent, and purposes of undergraduate education in religion seemed to some to have set a new direction and rationale for instruction in religion, whereas for others it has appeared that undergraduate departments of religion have so extended their domain and interests as to conflict severely with the professional studies appropriate to the seminary.2 It was hoped by both sponsoring associations that a thorough examination of what has been going on would clear the air and point in constructive directions.