Campus Ministry vs. Academic Chaplaincy

Campus Ministry vs. Academic Chaplaincy.

Same animal by another name, or sibling polar opposites?

When I speak about my call to ministry regarding colleges campuses, I often have to point out the nuance between Academic Chaplaincy and Campus Ministry.

Actually the confusing is probably due to assuming that the terms Campus Ministry and Campus Minister are always pseudonymous with each other. Which is something I that I occasionally fall prey too as well. Campus Ministry or a ministry to a school (not just college) can be broken down into three distinct categories (as taught at the Pacific School of Religion):

Congregational based: Is a mission from one church or a small number of churches that is directly involved in maintaining a presence on a college campus. Much like a Youth Group, but may not meet primarily at the congregation. UC -- Davis, U. Madison, and UNC -- Chapel Hill are all variations on this model: Intern-led, Dedicated Church Staff-led, and Part-time Staff Lead respectively.

Para-church Nonprofit: A non-profit or foundation that is setup to maintain a presence on campus for either a particular denomination or multi-faith coalition. A particular congregation may be the main backer, but the non-profit gets it's funding from multiple donors, and usually operates independently. So if Congregational-based is direct support, Para-church is indirect support. The oldest model for this that I know of that is still in practice is the Intervasity Christian Fellowship. Other examples include: Campus Crusade for Christ, Channing-Murray Foundation, and the Greater Worcester Unitarian Universalist Campus Ministries (GWUUCM)*. Several multi-faith models exist as well.

Academic Chaplaincy: A religious leader is hired by and works directly for school, much like a military or hospital chaplain would. Academic Chaplains as with other professional chaplains are more inclined to serve a multi-faith or non-denominational demographic, and can be called upon to function as an interfaith minister either officially or by default (depends on whether or not the institution can afford to hire more than one chaplain to accommodate different religions and or the particular affiliation and philosophy of the institution e.g. the military intentionally strives to be pluralistic in terms of religion as a matter of policy). Depending on the school, Academic Chaplains can also be considered members of faculty, and thus can serve as full deans, professors, and lecturers. A Ph.d, Th.D or equivalent is typically required, although some schools such as Tuffs have hired Chaplains with only Masters degrees.

*GWUUCM appears to be a bit of a partial hybrid between all three models in practice:
- a para-church organizational structure
- An Ordained Campus Minister is paid by the non-profit
- but is considered a non-paid chaplain by the college consortium
- Campus Minister holds an academic lecturer position at one of the member schools
- Yet is affiliated with one UU Congregation as per UUA community minister affiliation policy.

So, whether someone works directly for a congregation, a nonprofit, or a school their work would still fall under the term campus ministry. Now here's where the confusion begins.

Congregational based and para-church religious leaders are usually called Campus Ministers. The term is used interchangeably with ordained (those with a divinity degree and a religious endorsement) and lay leaders. I've argue against the dual use of the term, since it devalues the ordained clergy person in the eyes of fellow ordained congregational ministers (similar to what ordained community ministers often face). However, this is a concern that exists mostly outside of the UU world. Since so few ordained UU campus ministers exists, there are very few people like me around to argue to point.

The title Chaplain in campus ministry is usually reserved for an academic chaplain. This probably honors the widely acknowledge difference in roles between a congregational (or parish) minister and a professional chaplain (Note: that I am not extending the distinction to the UU catch-all term for non-parish ministers: community ministers, since their roles highly vary by individual preference and may overlap with both professional chaplain's and congregational minister's role, or may fill unique roles until themselves).

Here's where the disconnect happens. When I share with fellow UUs that I want to go into campus ministry, many assume I mean Academic Chaplaincy, and offer examples such a Rev. Scotty McClennan at Stanford or Greg McGonigle at Oberlin. Academic Chaplains are few in the UU world, yet Ordained Campus Ministers are even fewer, so for a lot of people the other two models don't even register. Interestingly, if you subtract the intern-ministers (still in training) working in campus ministry, I believe we have more UU Military Chaplains currently serving in the Armed forces than campus ministers. We have less than 10 Military Chaplains currently serving, although several are in training. You might break even if you add in Academic Chaplains, but I haven't looked too hard at their numbers.

Anyway, I usually, have to inform my peers that I'm not interested in an academic chaplaincy (one advanced degree is enough), which usually stops the conversation because so few people work in UU centered campus ministries (again: UU academic chaplaincies tend towards being multi-faith) that they can't even conceive of what the work would look like or how I would gain support for it.

Still many UU people do think it's vital work, we just don't feel the institutional need or have the learning models in place for it. The traditional vehicle for mentoring ministers in training is a year long internship in a congregation and 4 quarters (1 year) of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE i.e. a hospital chaplain in training) to be a certified as a chaplain. UU congregation ministers only need 1 quarter.

Those interested in campus ministry find a congregation with a part time intern-led campus ministry. Yet, the full time Ministers charge with mentoring the interns typically serves the congregation not the campus ministry. So, how is the intern expected to effectively lead the campus ministry when no one has taught them anything about campus ministry and they have no examples to draw from. The interns I have spoken too relate that the campus ministry has to be largely rebuilt every year by each succeeding interns, and if the congregation decides not to have an internship the following year, then the campus ministry either folds or is farmed out to another denomination's ministry such as the United Church of Christ. All of which is disastrous for growing a ministry let alone student lay leaders.

Think about what you church would be like if you got a new minister every year, or on some years decided to go without one completely. Each the new minister would bring a new philosophy / climate that would never have to mature, then at the end of a year it would be replaced or forgotten when the new minister came the following year. And since the college population is transient, the lay leadership, the heart of any religious congregation would be stillborn as each year would their main task would consist of trying to build, rebuild and build anew again.

In the Berkeley Campus Ministry's case (the CM that I've been working to reform) it is even worse because local seminarians leading the Campus ministry often trade out every semester (myself included).

But I could go on forever on this, it's partially the focus of the third Killam sermon I'm doing that deals with Young Adult Ministries.