Adult Faith Formation and Baptismal Covenant

1 credits · Divinity School

This course offers a vision and strategies for the holistic formation of adult disciples with vocations to serve church and world. In the early church, this process took shape as the 'catechumenate,' an intentional web of relationships, practices, and ritual symbols culminating in the Baptismal Rites of Initiation. Its approach to disciple-making was at once communal, sensual, deeply affecting and aesthetically-tuned while also speaking to the intellect. The catechumenate also was supported by a robustly imaginative theology of baptism whose playful and allusive use of symbols, figures and metaphors deepened its doxological character. Present day pastoral leaders should consider this way of formation not only for its lovely (and revelatory!) insights into the redemptive mission of God but also for its wise intuitions about human beings and their motivations.