I hated the city of Denver, but I loved Colorado, and I count my two years at Iliff as the best of my life.
This is not a link, but if you wish to visit Iliff's web site, you can cut and paste this URL into your location bar:
http://www.iliff.edu
While at Iliff I was heavily involved in the community's worship life, and I earned two awards for my liturgical arts work there: The Oma Wimberly Peyton Award, a memorial liturgical arts scholarship honoring a gifted musician who died tragically while a student at Iliff; and the R. Allene Sather Award, another memorial award for those who show "interest and ability in innovative worship."
The MTS is a general academic degree with a lot of flexibility built into it: no languages are required and the thesis is optional; one takes 24 of the 80 hours necessary for graduation out of the core Masters student curriculum.
When I finish my incompletes to qualify for my degree, I will have completed 80.5 quarter hours, including 4.5 hours transferred from Starr King School for the Ministry, A Unitarian Universalist school in Berkeley. My areas of concentration, organized as I apply them to my own life rather than by any categories that Iliff devises, fall out like so:
COUNSELING AND PASTORAL CARE 20
Pastoral Theology and Care 4
Creating Healthy Relationships in Pastoral Care 1
Pastoral Care in Death, Dying, Grief and Loss 4
Theology, Pastoral Action and Counseling 4
Experiencing the Art of Spiritual Direction 2
Professional Formation and Basic Field Education (hospice chaplaincy) 3
Justice & Peace Struggles: Self-Care for the Long Haul 2
RELIGION, THEOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY 16
World Religions 4
Comparative Philosophy of Religion 3
Pantheism and Panentheism 2
Religion in Human Transformation 3
Concept of God 4
WORSHIP, RITUAL AND LITURGICAL ARTS 12.5
Ritual and Worship 3
Re-Imagining Worship (transferred from Starr King) 4.5
BodySpirit Transformation 2
History of Worship at Iliff (Independent Study) 2
Choir 1
SOCIAL ETHICS 12
Methods and Theories in Justice & Peace 4
Preaching and Social Ethics 4
Race, Class, and Gender 4
CHURCH HISTORY 11
Unitarian Universalist History and Polity 3
Women in Early Christianity 4
Evangelicalism in Historical and Contemporary Perspective 4
RELIGIOUS LEADERSHIP 5
Christian Religious Education 3
Youth Ministries 2
SOCIOLOGY OF RELIGION 4
Congregational Studies 4
Myth, Religion and Story (audit)
