January 2019 Course Descriptions
BKSM welcomes anyone to take courses with us for personal enrichment or continuing education!
We encourage you to experience the remarkable community of learning, worship and fellowship that makes BKSM such a remarkable place for formation.
Did you know that scholarships are available for students taking classes for personal enrichment?
January courses begin officially on December 10, the focus weekend takes place January 12-13, and final assignments are due February 8.
While the weekend begins with breakfast at 7:30 for students on ordination, lay certificate and PMA tracks, course instruction does not begin until 1:00 p.m., which gives you the flexibility of driving to Topeka on Saturday morning
That being said, you are welcome to spend the night at Upton Hall on Friday night, and join us for breakfast and morning prayer on Saturday morning. While the 8:45 colloquium session is a closed group for students on ordination, PMA, and lay certificate tracks, you are encouraged to join us at 10:15 for our praxis session, which addresses some practical area of ministry.
If you would like to audit a course, the tuition is $100. If you would like to take the class for credit, the tuition is $180. The cost includes meals and overnight accommodations at Upton Hall on Friday and Saturday night (on a space-available basis). If you wish to take the class for credit, we encourage you to enroll by December 10. If you wish to audit the class, you may register at any time prior to the focus weekend. However, your learning experience will be better if you have time to complete the assigned readings for the class.
Get started by completing the online course registration form. If you have any questions, please contact the Very Rev. Dr. Don Compier, BKSM dean, at bksmdean2@gmail.com or (816) 217-4053.
Anglican Ethics
In this class, students explore distinctive Anglican approaches to moral questions by studying the traditions of Anglican ethics and their contemporary relevance in the practical life of today’s church.
Book List
Christian History I
This course explores Christian history from the end of the New Testament period (about A.D. 150) to AD 1000. We see Christianity as a small religion among many in the Roman Empire, then as that empire's official faith, and then as a growing movement continually encountering pagan cultures in the Mediterranean world and northern Europe, changing those cultures and being changed by them. Information on Eastern Christianity will help us understand Western Christianity. The course involves short lectures that leave plenty of room for discussion.
Reading List
Christian Ethics (D)
This class is designed for students enrolled on the deacon track as well anyone seeking a better understanding of Christian Ethics for personal enrichment. Rather than taking an issues-based approach to Christian ethics, this course will tell the story of Christian ethics, considering the ways in which people in the Church have responded to God's work in their midst through word and deed. In telling this story, there will be three primary trajectories: Scripture, historical theology, and contemporary theological ethics. These three trajectories will shape the questions of the class, some of which will sound like the following: What is the place of Christian-ethical reflection in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament? How might Kierkegaard's concept of the "teleological suspension of the ethical" in Fear and Trembling shape the way encounters those complex moments that demand ethical discernment? What has Christian ethics to do with modern city planning? As these and other questions are asked, at the forefront of deliberation will be the pursuit to understand the relation between the Word's eternal wisdom and the Word's work of making all things new.
Reading List
Polity & Canons
This course provides an overview of the governance of The Episcopal Church, including the Constitution and Canons of the Church, General Convention (and its Committees, Commissions, Agencies and Boards – “CCAB”), the offices of the Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies, the nine regional Provinces, the respective Dioceses and the individual congregations. In addition we will look at the governance (or lack thereof) of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the place of The Episcopal Church within that Communion.
Reading List
In this class, students explore distinctive Anglican approaches to moral questions by studying the traditions of Anglican ethics and their contemporary relevance in the practical life of today’s church.
Book List
- Anglican Theological Review 94:2 (articles by Greenman and Sedgwick) and 94:4 (articles by Smith, Dackson, and Gibson, and responses by Sedgwick, Davis, and Wondra). Available for free download at www.anglicantheologicalreview.org. Use the “read” button and then go to “browse previous issues.”
- Sedgwick, Timothy. The Christian Moral Life: Practices of Piety. Eerdmans, 1999.
- The Very Rev. Dr. Don H. Compier (Ph.D. in theology, Emory University) is Dean of the Bishop Kemper School for Ministry. He also serves as Canon Theologian of the Episcopal Diocese of Kansas and presides at the Spanish service at St. Paul’s in Kansas City, Kansas. Previously, Compier taught Master’s and Ph.D. courses in theology, philosophy, and modern church history at the Church Divinity School of the Pacific and the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, CA. He has also offered classes at Saint Paul School of Theology and Eden Theological Seminary. He led the graduate program in religion at Graceland University from 2002 until 2014, developing an innovative online curriculum. He is currently researching the history of Eucharistic thought in Anglicanism.
Christian History I
This course explores Christian history from the end of the New Testament period (about A.D. 150) to AD 1000. We see Christianity as a small religion among many in the Roman Empire, then as that empire's official faith, and then as a growing movement continually encountering pagan cultures in the Mediterranean world and northern Europe, changing those cultures and being changed by them. Information on Eastern Christianity will help us understand Western Christianity. The course involves short lectures that leave plenty of room for discussion.
Reading List
- Wilken, Robert L. The First Thousand Years: A Global History of Christianty. Yale University Press, 2012.
- The Very Rev. Dr. George Wiley taught religion at Baker University for 35 years and has been serving the Diocese of Kansas as canon pastor since 2014. He holds a Ph.D. in historical theology from Emory University. As a teacher, he is known for engaging with students and creating an inviting classroom atmosphere
Christian Ethics (D)
This class is designed for students enrolled on the deacon track as well anyone seeking a better understanding of Christian Ethics for personal enrichment. Rather than taking an issues-based approach to Christian ethics, this course will tell the story of Christian ethics, considering the ways in which people in the Church have responded to God's work in their midst through word and deed. In telling this story, there will be three primary trajectories: Scripture, historical theology, and contemporary theological ethics. These three trajectories will shape the questions of the class, some of which will sound like the following: What is the place of Christian-ethical reflection in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament? How might Kierkegaard's concept of the "teleological suspension of the ethical" in Fear and Trembling shape the way encounters those complex moments that demand ethical discernment? What has Christian ethics to do with modern city planning? As these and other questions are asked, at the forefront of deliberation will be the pursuit to understand the relation between the Word's eternal wisdom and the Word's work of making all things new.
Reading List
- Brock, Brian. Captive to Christ, Open to the World: On Doing Christian Ethics in Public. Eugene: Cascade Books, 2014.
- Wells, Samuel and Quash, Ben. Introduction to Christian Ethics. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, 2010.
- Wells, Samuel, editor. Christian Ethics: An Introductory Reader. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, 2010.
- Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Ethics, ed. Ilse Tödt, Heinz Eduard Tödt, Ernst Feil, and Clifford Green, trans. Reinhard Krauss, Charles West, and Douglas Scott. Dietrich Bonhoeffer Works 6. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005 (Paperback, 2008).
- Dr. Tyler Atkinson is Assistant Professor of Religion at Bethany College, Lindsborg, KS. Dr. Atkinson holds an M.Div. from the Divinity School, Duke University and a Ph.D. in theological ethics from the University of Aberdeen. His doctoral thesis, Singing at the Winepress: Ecclesiastes and the Ethics of Work, has recently been published by Bloomsbury T&T Clark (2015).
Polity & Canons
This course provides an overview of the governance of The Episcopal Church, including the Constitution and Canons of the Church, General Convention (and its Committees, Commissions, Agencies and Boards – “CCAB”), the offices of the Presiding Bishop and the President of the House of Deputies, the nine regional Provinces, the respective Dioceses and the individual congregations. In addition we will look at the governance (or lack thereof) of the worldwide Anglican Communion and the place of The Episcopal Church within that Communion.
Reading List
- Many Parts, One Body – How the Episcopal Church Works, James Dator with Jan Nunley (New York: Church Publishing, 2010)
- Constitution and Canons of The Episcopal Church 2015: Together with the Rules of Order Adopted by the General Convention 1789-2015
- Paperback copy is $35 and available on Amazon, or free online edition can be downloaded at: https://www.episcopalchurch.org/files/documents/2015_candc.pdf
- Mr. Mike Morrow is an attorney with 30 years service as a career law clerk in the U.S. District Court in Kansas. He is a former member and President of the Council of
Trustees in the Diocese of Kansas. He presently serves as the intake officer. He has been a deputy to six general conventions. In 2018, he served on the general convention
committee on Safeguarding and Title IV. He previously served on the Canons committee for three conventions, including the 2009 convention which drafted the present Title IV canons.