CLAREMONT, Calif. — A rabbi, a minister and an imam walk into a classroom and it’s no joke.
The Claremont School of Theology has taught Methodist ministers and theologians for more than a century, but in the fall they’ll try an unorthodox approach: cross-training the nation’s future Muslim, Christian and Jewish religious leaders in classrooms scattered around Southern California as they work toward their respective degrees.
The experimental approach is intended to create U.S. religious leaders who not only preach tolerance, but who have lived it themselves by rubbing shoulders withthose in other faiths.
The idea has met resistance in some religious communities; its architects say that only underscores the need for such an approach.
“Christians attend school with Christians, Jewish with Jewish and Muslims with Muslim,” said Jerry Campbell, president of the Claremont School of Theology. “Educating people in a segregated environment is not a way to teach them to be peacemakers. It only steeps them in their own religion and with their own people.”
Conceived in 2006, the University Project will allow seminary students at Claremont to cross-enroll in programs that train future Muslim and Jewish religiousleaders while working toward their own degrees in Christian theology. Claremont already has chaplaincy programs for Muslims and Jews who ultimately work as counselors in institutional settings, but they don’t have rabbinical and imam certification programs. Course topics will include inter-religious conflict resolution, Scripture and ethics.
Starting this fall, rabbinical students enrolled at the Academy of Jewish Religion’s California chapter will be able to study at Claremont. And by next year, the project will include an Islamic program that aims to create a standard for training American imams by working with the LA-based Islamic Center of Southern California.Classes at the Islamic institute will be taught by Claremont professors and will also be open to seminarians and rabbinical students.
The collaborative effort among the seminary, Jewish academy and Islamic center is believed to be the first to integrate the three studies.
Claremont has used an initial $10 million gift to hire the first Muslim and second Jewish faculty members. If the project takes off, its architects hope to add Hinduism and Buddhism and house the project under one roof.
The program has opponents.
The United Methodists, for example, have withheld funds and have called for a review of the school’s curriculum.
Religion, Pages 17 on 06/12/2010