The theological education consortium of which Montreal Dio is a part has received a major grant from an American philanthropic foundation.
The five year grant of $1-million (USD) will help the Montreal School of Theology in its ongoing work of preparing pastoral leaders to face the new and ever-changing challenges of ministry in our contemporary world.
The grant is part of the Lilly Endowment’s three-phase Pathways for Tomorrow Initiative, which is designed to support theological colleges in Canada and the United States as they face the many challenges of preparing church leaders for the church and world of today and tomorrow.
“This is a huge vote of confidence in theological education in Montreal,” said Dio principal Jesse Zink. “This was a very competitive process involving hundreds of theological schools across the U.S. and Canada. We’re grateful that Lilly has recognized the value of what we do here and given us the means to continue to expand our programs in new ways to serve the needs of our changing church.”
MST’s grant proposal focused on three main areas.
First, MST will launch the Montreal Mission Internship, a program that Dio has offered at times in the past. (See page one.) MMI is a summer service-learning program that allows young people to discern a vocation to lay and ordained ministry while serving others in community.
Second, MST will thoroughly revise its field education program. Under the leadership of a new Director of Field Education, MST will develop new ways of training future clergy to ensure that their field education experiences prepare them for the kind of ministry they will engage in in coming decades.
Finally, MST will launch a new mentoring program for clergy who are new to ministry. This is based on a program that The Presbyterian College has offered in the past. Each of these programs will be ecumenical in nature and focused on providing leaders in the church with opportunities for contextual engagement, reflective learning, and growth as a pastoral leader.
Roland De Vries, principal of The Presbyterian College and Director of MST, said, “This grant will enable MST to pursue its renewed mission with creativity and with strengthened institutional capacities—particularly in engagement with our unique and dynamic context of Montreal. This project and supporting grant represent a profoundly hopeful moment as MST and its constituent colleges creatively reimagine theological education.”
Across North America, 84 other theological schools are receiving a total of $82 million in grants through this second phase of Lilly’s Pathways Initiative.
