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Our Air and Water

It's the air we breathe; it's the water we swim in.

Lutherans have always been teachers and learners. You might even say Lutheranism is synonymous with teaching and learning. After all, the flames of reform were fanned in a university setting. And we've never left the teaching and learning to chance. Our immigrant forebears were quick to found colleges and seminaries, Bible colleges and continuing education centers, folk-schools and camps. Where ever congregations took root, schools of all sorts popped up — on Sundays, weekdays, evenings, and weekends. Whenever the learners were gathered, the teachers would not be far behind. Teaching and learning are in our DNA.

We could write volumes about the challenges facing those who lead congregations and church-related institutions and agencies. But you know them well. You're asked to be the expert on the Bible, Christian doctrine, and ethics. These days you need to understand business and finance, economics and science, world affairs, and world religions. Your days probably find you as teacher one moment and learner the next. Sometimes you make the move with agility and grace. Sometimes you feel clumsy and uncertain.

You're likely no longer to be one of the few college-educated people in your congregation or community. You're working alongside countless other well-educated people. Some invite you to teach them how to pray. Others want to talk with you about the latest book by an eminent theologian or the popular book on Islam they just picked up. Still others invite you to walk with them as they explore their various vocations as neighbor, worker, employer, and family member.

In the pages which follow, you'll hear from colleagues who have invested themselves deeply in the teaching and learning ministries of the ELCA. They tell tales of the pioneering work of those who founded the early continuing education centers. But they also recount the demise of some of these same centers as populations shifted, funding priorities changed, and learning opportunities multiplied. They describe the hunger for learning that is attracting countless new learners to the tables where the feast of faith's wisdom is spread. And a feast it is, served up by camps and colleges, conference centers and seminaries, life-long learning centers, and congregations.

Yet even as the spotlight shines on these providers of learning and sheds light on the rich resources for learning they provide, the attention still comes back to you. You, associate in ministry, pastor, deaconess and diaconal minister, are central to this Lutheran commitment to teaching and learning. It has fanned the flames of your ministry. It's gotten into your DNA. It's the table where you feast regularly.

I hope this issue of Lutheran Partners and the focus on teaching and learning will nourish you in your teaching and encourage you in your own learning.

Richard Bruesehoff is the director for life-long learning in the Vocation and Education program unit of the ELCA, Chicago, Illinois.

Comment
by William A. Decker, editor

This article appeared in March / April 2007 • Volume 23 • Number 2

A Partner First Class

Call it one of those little ironies of life, but the pastor who baptized me also had a hand in shaping the magazine for which I would eventually be working.

I was baptized in April 1952 by Pastor E. Raymond Shaheen. Twenty-seven years later, Pastor Shaheen was asked to join an advisory committee for a new magazine of the Lutheran Church in America. The chief goal of the magazine, called LCA Partners (renamed Lutheran Partners in 1985), was to "increase the confidence, competence, effectiveness, and joy in Christian ministry" among its leadership, according to its "Statement of Editorial Policy." ¹ The advisory committee, known as the "Consulting Committee," was established to advise the editor in the planning and selection of its contents. ²

Raymond Shaheen's name appears on the Masthead/Table of Contents page along with the names of the other early editorial advisors — Katherine Baxter, Raymond S. Larson, Steven L. McKinley, Gary W. Pence, Vernon R. Schreiber, Harold C. Skillrud, and Carl T. Uehling. He was listed as a member of the committee through the June 1980 issue.

On Dec. 12, 2006, E. Raymond Shaheen died. He was 91 years old. ³

A large part of his life and legacy fits in well with the emphasis of this current issue — Higher Education and the Church — as well as the topic of lifelong learning which this issue is examining. He was one who bridged the worlds of education and church well. He spent 45 years in the parish from 1940 to 1985. Then he returned to his alma mater, Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania, taking on the mantle, as a volunteer, of special assistant to the president. He did this job for the remainder of his life.

For two of these years at Susquehanna — 1986 and 1996 — he served as interim chaplain. But he also had a vision for the educational and social needs of individuals from the community and surrounding central Pennsylvania region who were in their senior years. He founded the university's Institute for Lifelong Learning in 1990 which has been serving older adults in central Pennsylvania since then. He also worked as the Institute's first director and began branches in York, Pennsylvania, and Silver Springs, Maryland.

Along with his interest in publications he was a fine writer. As I grazed through some Web sites, I discovered, for instance, that he wrote columns for the local papers in northcentral Pennsylvania.

When I was a youngster, I remember that local pastors were often called upon to write faith-based columns for their communities' newspapers. I came across one of Raymond Shaheen's articles published in the national edition of The Grit — a local and national newspaper which at one time was published in Williamsport, Pennsylvania (and for which I worked during my college years) — in its March 25, 1951, issue. In the article, he asked the readers to use their imaginations and try to picture a conversation between a seller of incense, spices, and perfumes and Mary Magdalene, who had come to purchase these items so she could place them around the body of the entombed Jesus. Mary later returns to the seller, not having used one single iota of her purchase. She then describes some astonishing news about what she discovered at the tomb where Jesus had been laid. ⁴

Family Memorabilia
But it was his pastoral and personal touches, saved as family memorabilia, which I'll long remember, including: personal letters, written in long-hand, to my brother and I, only three and six years of age at the time, when our mother died; and correspondence between my father and him when my dad was a young adult in law school, also upon the death of his mother.

These personal letters and his newspaper features point to some of the virtues inherent in him as a Christian communicator and pastor: clarity, imagination, and compassion.

In my mind's eye, I chiefly see him standing in the pulpit of the first congregation he served, Messiah Lutheran Church, South Williamsport, Pennsylvania, with his wife, Winifred, close by in one of the pews. It was not unusual for him to provide ministerial assistance and pulpit supply at Messiah during the years he spent at Susquehanna University. On some of my visits home, I would find him at Messiah, continuing to tell the story of Jesus to the first community of faith I ever knew.

The apostle Paul eloquently describes his gratitude for the shared work which has taken place between the saints in Philippi and Timothy and himself. The RSV calls it a "partnership in the gospel" while the NRSV calls it a "sharing" in the gospel (Philippians 1:3-5).

"I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing (or partnership) in the gospel from the first day until now."

My few words here provide only a selective reading of his life, pertinent mostly to this magazine and my personal experience. Much more could be said. But for many in congregations, the colleges of the church, and the communities and individuals he loved and served, E. Raymond Shaheen was one of those partners in the gospel first class for whom we are all very grateful.

A memorial service for E. Raymond Shaheen will be held on Saturday, April 28 at 11 a.m. in Weber Chapel Auditorium, Susquehanna University, Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania.

William A. Decker is editor of Lutheran Partners magazine, Chicago, Illinois.