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I remember vividly the moment I made the connection between using the news and teaching about faith. I was reading a December 2002 issue of THE CHRISTIAN CENTURY. As I scanned the news, read the poetry, contemplated the art, and reflected on the articles and editorials, it hit me: "This is curriculum."
Curriculum as a resource for supporting adults in their growth in a life of faith has, in many Protestant traditions, followed a similar pattern of focusing on Bible study or theological/ethical issues with printed study guides prepared by denomination curriculum writers. The lead time required for such production means that the contemporary issues people of faith struggle daily to understand, interpret, and respond to can be left unaddressed. The news in front of us is curricular content for students and members of faith communities seeking ways to make sense of the complexity of life in this millennium.
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As a seminary professor in the field of practical theology, I offer courses in religious education. I teach students how to choose and evaluate curriculum (print, multimedia, Web) and how to write curriculum for use with a variety of age groups and settings in congregations. Until four years ago, the primary focus of curriculum for religious education had been on what was available from denominational publishers. Age-graded curriculum, with print pieces for learners and leaders, has been an educational priority for many denominations since the first quarter of the twentieth century, but a century later, curriculum about religion in congregations and classrooms alike needs to integrate more than a single medium and more than only one disciplinary frame of reference.
I have two learning objectives in my courses preparing adults of all ages, from a variety of denominations within the Christian tradition, for pastoral ministry. It is important to help them recast their understanding of curriculum, and it is equally important for them to identify the kinds of knowledge, skills, and abilities required to teach adults in a congregation.
In a 24/7 world, the immediacy of news in our lives is ever present, and so is our need for understanding and interpretation. As I write, the page one headlines in my newspaper focus on the war in Iraq, church burnings in Alabama, the ongoing restoration of New Orleans, a local university professor praised by the president of Iran because of his belief that the Holocaust did not happen, and charges of corruption by elected city and state government officials. And, of course, the inside pages are full of the ever-present grim realities of the impoverished conditions in which many people live.
Students and adults from many faith traditions share a common desire for the opportunity to make sense of the news in light of their faith commitments. Parents want help in knowing how to explain these events from a faith perspective to their children. Theological schools have the ability both to teach and to model the role of pastor as one who is a faithful interpreter, who through preaching and teaching helps congregants integrate life in the world with the life of faith.
Maria Harris, a graduate professor of religious education at Fordham University who also taught at Andover Newton Theological School, wrote in FASHION ME A PEOPLE: CURRICULUM IN THE CHURCH (1989) that "we are moving toward a creative vision that sees all the facets of the church's life as the church curriculum with curricular materials named simply 'resources.'" In the foreword to that book, Craig Dykstra suggests that "curriculum is about the mobilizing of creative, educative powers in such a way as to 'fashion a people' -- curriculum is an activity, a practice of a people."
The kind of vision that Harris identified over 15 years ago has become a reality. The immediate accessibility of news and information that connects people to events and issues in their community and around the world presents curricular opportunities that can "fashion a people" for a life of faithful response. Contexts for teaching and learning in congregations provide opportunities for learners of all ages to become skilled in engaging with issues in the news through thoughtful reflection and contemplation. Such activity moves curriculum off the printed page and into the realm of practicing the faith.
The connection between news and teaching about religion and faith is not about forcing religion into the news. Rather, it is about finding the connections already present in so many aspects of the news. Writing in February about his newspaper's decision not to publish the caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad that had been published in Denmark's largest daily newspaper, CHICAGO TRIBUNE columnist Eric Zorn included a picture of the flag of Denmark with his column and commented that by printing this flag, "it says if you aren't regularly offended, insulted, provoked or angered by something you read, see or hear, then either you're not paying attention or you live in a repressive society."
Zorn's comment could also be that of theologians. Religious beliefs and practices of faith should provoke as well as inspire, offend as well as comfort. Using the news as curriculum in teaching can provide a bridge between an individual's hearing and processing capacities and a dynamic group setting in which people come together to hear, digest, and reflect, to be "fashioned" together, to use Harris's term. Curricular experimentation can do just that.
As an educator, I am also concerned with how faith is integrated into the thinking and acting of people of all ages in congregations. There is the world of learning about faith and living it in the world that is transmitted through small groups gathered around tables in a spare adult classroom in a church. Such groups like the curriculum their denomination provides and enjoy the discussion of written material that helps them engage in Bible study or dialogue about contemporary topics of faith and life. Group members rely on the newspaper, television, radio, and news magazines for information about the world. They have a habit of observing the Sabbath -- of learning and worshipping together -- that is part of the rhythm of their lives.
But what of the people who are not in that room? They may learn differently using other "intelligences" (Gardner 2000). They may not be drawn to a traditional church school curriculum. They may be oriented to different methods of teaching and learning, such as service and mission projects -- a primary learning style for connecting knowledge and living a life of faith. Their sources of information about the world come from Web sites, satellite radio, news, and conversation with friends through text messaging, blogs, and e-mail. Participation in church on Sunday may be limited to worship, and convenience is definitely a factor. They may prefer to gather in a tea room for a book discussion or in a local bar for "theology on tap."
A common question for both of these groups is how to make sense of the world in which they live, how to understand what they hear, see, read, and experience in the news in the light of the understandings and commitments of their faith. Both, I think, seek to find ways of thoughtful reflection on, engagement with, and response to what is reported and interpreted in the media. In an age of immediacy, faith commitments provide an important lens through which immediate issues are processed, assessed, and acted upon.
After my initial "aha" moment while reading THE CHRISTIAN CENTURY, I initiated small writing and teaching projects that provided some basis for reflection on using the news to help students and people of faith make sense of the world. One involved working with editors at THE CHRISTIAN CENTURY to develop a Web-based study guide for each bimonthly issue of the magazine for five months in 2004. The guide provided a process of teaching and learning with discussion questions that engaged different parts of the magazine -- news, poetry, book/film/music reviews, editorials, columns, lectionary and feature articles. The goal was to help readers see the potential for the articles as curriculum for use with youth or adults in a congregation or classroom.
A second CHRISTIAN CENTURY project involved identifying religious topics that were also major news subjects and writing study guides that would provide discussion questions for use with particular articles published in the magazine. Three study guides are currently available at christiancentury.org: "God and the Economy," "Do Christians and Muslims Worship the Same God?" and "Homosexuality and the Christian Faith."
During the fall of 2004, I cotaught an adult education course at Fourth Presbyterian Church in Chicago on issues related to the national election. For eight weeks we explored major topics being addressed by the presidential candidates: immigration, health care, education, abortion, stem cell research, sexuality. The discussion resources were articles from a range of print and visual media, THE CHRISTIAN CENTURY, and election study guides.
A year later, in the fall of 2005, I offered a seminary course on teaching methodology. One session focused on types of discussion questions. Students were asked to read a print article either from THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE or THE NEW YORK TIMES or from various Web sites and write three different kinds of questions. Articles from the following Web sites were provided: "RELIGION & ETHICS NEWSWEEKLY" at pbs.org/religion; speakingoffaith.org; Rabbi Marc Gellman's editorials on msnbc.com and in NEWSWEEK; "This I Believe" at npr.org; poetry from THE WRITER'S ALMANAC, a production of "American Public Media" online at publicmedia.org and broadcast on National Public Radio; and commentary from NPR. This was a more implicit way to connect individuals preparing for a vocation as clergy with how the news can be used in teaching and learning with adults in a congregation.
Reviewing denominational curriculum for examples that illustrate Craig Dykstra's criteria of "fashioning" and Harris's vision for curriculum, two are exemplary. SEASONS OF THE SPIRIT is the multiage curriculum of the United Church of Christ and the United Church of Canada based on the Common Lectionary. spiritseasons.com is the Web site that supports users of this curriculum. One of the tabs on the site posted each week is "Spirit Sightings," two pages that provide a brief article often focused on an item from the news, along with discussion questions for one of the lectionary texts related to the article, and a prayer and links to related Web sites. This is curriculum!
The other example is THE THOUGHTFUL CHRISTIAN, a new online study resource center developed in 2006 by the Presbyterian Publishing Corporation. It has five areas of study: Contemporary Issues, Bible and Theology, Spirituality, Christian Living, and Popular Culture. The topics in Contemporary Issues come right from the newspaper: creationism, evolution and intelligent design; the war in Iraq; Islam; should the Ten Commandments be displayed in public; stem cell research; end-of-life decisions; same-sex marriage. Written for timely discussion by adult groups in a variety of congregational contexts, each topic has leader suggestions for one or two sessions.
In my seminary classes in religious education, the topic of curriculum (sources, form, writing, and evaluation) is addressed in every course. The difference for me now is that in addition to sending adult learners of all ages to the resource center in our library to preview and evaluate print curriculum for particular age groups, I also send them to the Web. For the latter, the evaluative criteria are different. These are the questions that guide curricular Web research:
- What do you see on this Web site that has potential for use as curriculum in your congregation?
What additional work needs to be done in order to make it usable with a group in the church?
- What background preparation for the leader is required for using this news article?
- What connections do you make between this news article and the Bible, theology, the life of faith?
- For which age group would you use this article or media clip?
We live in a globally connected culture focused on the immediate -- immediate understanding, comprehension, and response to the news of the world. Whether teaching in a congregation or other faith community, a seminary, college, or university, to undergraduates or graduate students, young adults or older adults, using the news as content for discussion provides the opportunity for them to address the issues raised by the news and to identify their own connections or responses to it.
"For such a time as this" (Esther 4:14) it is essential that we become responsible exegetes of both texts -- the news and the Bible. To paraphrase a quote that has been inferred from the writing of Karl Barth, we should teach with the Bible in one hand and the newspaper in the other. Making sense of the world as it is played out before us in the news is a difficult task "at the end of the day." Liberation theologians speak of practicing "theology at sunset," which is a way of sitting with the events of the day and understanding them in light of belief and practice.
Teaching with the news and the Bible through the lens of faith is a way of helping people name and interpret their own religious tradition as well as understand the experience of others who define their lives in different religious terms. Curriculum such as this enables our thoughtful participation as faithful global citizens in this world.
References
Gardner, Howard. INTELLIGENCE REFRAMED: MULTIPLE INTELLIGENCES FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY (New York: Basic Books, 2000). Gardner suggests that humans learn in a variety of ways, or "intelligences," as he names them (oral/linguistic, analytical, artistic, musical, kinesthetic, nature, interpersonal, and intrapersonal), based on the strengths and weaknesses of the different intelligences. This has strong implications for how we teach and learn with adults.
Harris, Maria. FASHION ME A PEOPLE (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 1989).
Elizabeth F. Caldwell is the Harold Blake Walker Professor of Pastoral Theology at McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago, where she teaches courses in religious education. Her research interests include the role of the congregation in nurturing faith in families and methods of teaching and learning in theological education and in congregations.
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