The Homiletics area will not be admitting new students for the coming academic year. We'd like to encourage you to contact the GTU Admissions Office to explore additional potential areas of study across the range of options.

Degrees Offered: Ph.D.; Th.D.

Historically, the academic discipline of homiletics evolved as a way to describe and improve the practice of preaching in the context of a faith community. It is a discipline with theoretical, practical, and spiritual components, all of which depend upon dialogue with other disciplines. The program in homiletics, therefore, requires students to make significant connections with other areas of study, as well as to continue to analyze and improve their own practice as preachers.

Objectives
The first objective of the doctoral program is to familiarize students with the body of literature associated with the history, theology, theories and practices of preaching. This literature is delineated in a Comprehensive Bibliography that is made current every year and distributed to students as they enter the program. The second objective is to prepare students to contextualize major historical and contemporary figures in the field of homiletics in their historical, social, theological and liturgical contexts. The third objective is to prepare students to do research in their major field of study.

Admissions Requirements
In addition to other GTU requirements for admission, students planning to concentrate in homiletics must submit evidence of their training and experience as preachers.

Language Requirement
Students must fulfill the GTU requirement of certification in one modern foreign language other than the students’ native language.

Course Work
Students are required to take a minimum of four foundational seminars in the history, theology, theory, and practices of preaching. Two seminars are required: The History of Christian Preaching and Contemporary Homiletic Theory. The two other seminars may be chosen from advanced, praxis-oriented classes that will be offered throughout their two year course of study (e.g., Preaching Across Cultures, Performance Issues in Preaching, Prophetic Preaching, etc). Students will engage in other course work chosen in consultation with the advisor. Students are required to spend one semester teaching with a member of the Homiletics faculty. The purpose of this requirement is to provide an opportunity for students to engage in conversation about pedagogical challenges related to the discipline, to assess one pedagogical model, and to gain experiences related to student/teacher interaction in the homiletic classroom.

Comprehensive Examinations
The comprehensive examination process contains the following elements:

• One, four-hour, closed book examination on the history and theology of preaching. The purpose of the exam is to measure the student’s ability to locate the contributions of homileticians in their varied historical, theological and liturgical contexts. This exam is designed by the student’s advisor in consultation with the faculty member who has taught the History of Christian Preaching seminar.
• One, four-hour, closed book examination on contemporary theories of preaching. The purpose of the exam is to measure the student’s ability to articulate, evaluate, compare and contrast contemporary homiletic theories. This exam is designed by the student’s advisor in consultation with the faculty members who have taught Contemporary Homiletic Theory and praxis courses.
• One 25-35 page paper which focuses on an issue related to the history, theology, theories or practices of preaching. The paper is intended to measure the student’s understanding of a particular issue or question, the ability to do research, to bring together appropriate resources from the field of homiletics, and to write a coherent paper that indicates clear purpose, method, scope, and development of thought. The topic for the paper is chosen in conversation with the student’s advisor and is approved by homiletics faculty.
• One 25-35 page interdisciplinary paper which intentionally puts the field of homiletics into conversation with another discipline or field of study. This paper is intended to measure the student’s ability to integrate the field of homiletics into the larger arena of theological and social discourse, to bring together appropriate resources, do research, and to write a paper with clear purpose, method, scope, and the development of thought. The topic for the paper is chosen in conversation with the student’s advisor and is approved by the homiletics faculty.

Allied Field Requirements
If students want to claim homiletics as an allied field, they must:

• Take one advanced level homiletics course approved by the Area faculty;
• Take one written exam based on the approved "allied field" bibliography.
  
  

Dissertation
After successfully completing the Comprehensive Examinations the student submits a dissertation proposal to the Area faculty and the Doctoral Council for approval. An oral defense is conducted upon completion of the dissertation.

CORE DOCTORAL FACULTY IN HOMILETICS

JANA CHILDERS • SFTS (Homiletics and Speech-Communication)
Textual preaching; the preacher's creative process; the preacher's spiritual life; pneumatology and preaching.

LINDA CLADER • CDSP (Homiletics)
Prophetic preaching; imagination; metaphor.

THOMAS G. ROGERS • PLTS (Homiletics)
Cross-cultural study; rhetoric; oral interpretation.

MARY DONOVAN TURNER • PSR (Homiletics)
Hebrew Bible and preaching; women, voice, and preaching.

CONSORTIAL FACULTY RESOURCES

ALMA FAITH CRAWFORD • SKSM (Worship Life)
Liberal religious liturgy; race theory and ethnic studies; multicultural sacred rhetoric; preaching for individual, cultural, and institutional transformation.

SANGYIL SAM PARK • ABSW (Pastoral Theology)
Narrative preaching; New Testament ecclesiology; urban ecclesiology; congregational studies.
KEITH RUSSELL • ABSW (Pastoral Theology)
Narrative preaching; New Testament ecclesiology; urban ecclesiology; congregational studies.

J. ALFRED SMITH • ABSW (Preaching and Church Ministries)
Preaching and hermeneutics; social ethics; African-American religious history; theological values in literature.