Nashotah House is one of two orthodox Episcopal seminaries in the country, and the only one of 11 that shapes students in the Anglo-Catholic tradition that emphasizes the church’s Catholic, rather than Protestant, history and culture.
Students come, they say, for any number of reasons: the classical education, with its emphasis on Hebrew and Greek languages; the quasi-monastic culture; the sense of community; the focus on prayer and liturgy.
“This just matches more with my piety,” said Forrest Tucker, 31, a father of four and one on the way, who lives with his family in married-student housing on campus.
“You get into the spiritual rhythm of life here, and it becomes a very important part of your life,” he said.
I thought at the time Robert Munday stepped down as Dean there was something more to the story. So he was basically forced out because of his dalliance with the ACNA.
For those of us who have a love of Nashotah, the fact that it has bowed to pressure of TEC is a terrifying development. How long can it remain orthodox when the bishops who are sending clergy refuse ordination to anyone who is orthodox? The ordinands sent by Milwaukee and Chicago are vetted to remove anyone who opposes the TEC agenda- so Nashotah will end up providing the clergy whose job it will be to lead orthodox congregations (to which they will be assigned) into the “new thing.”
Within days after approving gay weddings in Chicago, “bishop” Lee was given a DD by Nashotah. Which is no statement of orthodoxy.
Congrats to Nashotah and to +Ed Salmon. May they bear much fruit for the Kingdom. #1 – I note that Robt. Munday remains on the faculty.
Knowing what I know about Ed Salmon I highly doubt that this school will become a sanctuary for revisionists. He was a part of the trio of mighty bishops that created the Diocese of South Carolina — the strongest, healthiest diocese in TEC.
Congratulations to Nashotah House!
The fact that Nashotah House was recently able to build a new $1.6 million building and is growing again, while most other Episcopal seminaries are dwindling and shutting down or selling off their property, is certainly encouraging. Like others above, I offer my congratualations to “the House.”
But although there are encouraging signs of vitality, Nashotah still faces immense challenges, as do all small residential seminaries these days. The recent report from CDSP that they were running a deficit of something like $1.5 million on a #4 million annual budget, and were laying off faculty, is a grim reminder of just how tough it has become to run seminaries the way we are used to doing in Episcopal and Anglican circles in North America. Of course, the dire straits that led to the closing of Seabury-Western in 2008 and Bexley Hall in Rochester, as well as the selling off of the property of EDS in Cambridge and General Seminary in NYC, illustrate the severe financial pressures all TEC seminaries face.
It’s important to note that Nashotah House and Trinity in Ambridge aren’t immune. Nor is Cranmer House, the REC school in Houston (and an approved ACNA seminary). So many things about preparation for parish ministry are more caught than taught, that distance learning online really isn’t a feasible way to do most seminary work. Thus TSM and Nashotah deserve all the help and support they can get from orthodox Anglicans everywhere in North America.
David Handy+
P.S., while surfing the Nashtoah House website, I came across this nice bit of marketing, extolling what sets The House apart:
[i]”No other seminary is so committed to saturating theological education with spiritual formation. No other seminary so firmly locates theology within doxology…no other seminary is so steeped in the enduring turth of the one holy catholic and apostolic faith.”[/i]
I trust the implicit context for those bold and sweeping claims is North American Anglicanism. That is, no other Anglican seminary on this continent can match Nashotah in those areas.
Plus, did anyone else notice how brightly lit the chapel at Nashotah is in the attractive photo accompanying the article? Very different from the dim, Victorain shadows that I recall from my prior visits to Nashotah, and a welcome change.
Finally, with regard to the worries of some that the selection of +Salmon might presage a lessening of Nashotah’s historic commitment to the full-fledged Anglo-Catholic tradition, I must admit that I share some qualms about that myself. It’s certainly notable that the website highlights a supportive plug from +N.T. Wright, no high churchman. Likewise, former ABoC George Carey is emphatically low church as well. More significantly, the hiring of Garwood Anderson as Nashotah’s NT instructor and making academic dean, when he’s pretty low church too (or was), is a sign that Nashotah may be seeking to broaden its appeal by casting its net for students more widely. (That’s not a slam on “Woody” BTW; he’s a fine teacher and very orthodox).
If so, (and it’s a fairly big IF) that does seem to risk Nashotah diluting its appeal to its base Angl;o-Catholic constituency. However, I’m not worried about Nashotah compromising its integrity with regard to upholding Christian orthodoxy.
And I’d love to hear from someone at The House that the fears expressed above are groundless.
David Handy+
Oops. I meant CDSP is running a deficit over a third the size of its [i]$4 million[/i] budget. And of course, it’s entirely possible that Dr. Garwood (Woody) Anderson has transcended his low church Protestant past, as Dr. Munday (a former Southern Baptist) did.
David Handy+
Though I have only spent a week at Nashotah for the residential phase of a distance learning course, it was enough to make me fall head over heels in love with the place. I am troubled by the recent changes. Reaching out to TEC in an intentional way is a very dangerous policy to embark upon. And Fr. Handy, I really loved the dimly lit interior of the chapel of St. Mary the Virgin. Beginning and ending every day in that quiet, solemn, atmosphere was something special. There was no doubt that one was on sacred ground.
Halogen bulbs have much to answer for.
[b]#6. New Reformation Advocate:[/b]
(1) +Salmon has already been dean once before, and I’m not aware that he watered down Nashotah’s Anglo-Catholic traditions then…
(2) I don’t know where you live, so I don’t know if you are familiar with the Church of the Holy Communion in Charleston, SC. Holy Communion is most definitely an Anglo-Catholic parish, and there are a few others in SC, too. Perhaps you should ask Dow Sanderson or Danny Clarke (the rector and curate, respectively, at Holy Communion) if they think +Salmon’s appointment is likely to “presage a lessening of Nashotah’s historic commitment to the full-fledged Anglo-Catholic tradition” — but I’m willing to bet you any amount of money that their answer would be something along the lines of, “NO!”
(3) George Carey is, indeed, low church — but, to the best of my knowledge, no one who is at all familiar with +Salmon has [b][i]ever[/b][/i] described [i]him[/i] that way. Incidentally, +Salmon has a small portrait of one former ABC hanging on his wall at home, along with a handwritten letter sent to him by that former ABC — and it is not Carey, but Michael Ramsey.
(4) If it helps to set your mind at rest, +Salmon’s wife, Louise, is a devoted — and outspoken — Anglo-Catholic.