History and Mission

The Mission of the Center for Swedenborgian Studies is to prepare qualified individuals for ministry in the Swedenborgian Church, to serve as a center of Swedenborgian scholarship and to make Swedenborgian resources for theological education available to the wider church and community.

The Center for Swedenborgian Studies has been a graduate school for religious training and scholarship since 1866 and today functions as a think-tank for Swedenborgian Studies globally as well as the official seminary of the Swedenborgian Church of North America. Providing courses and programs supporting academic, vocational, and personal growth journeys for students who want to or are required to take Swedenborgian Studies, the Center’s offerings are multidisciplinary with strengths in theology, biblical spirituality, history of ideas, spiritual formation, literature, art and architecture, science and spirituality, pluralism, eighteenth-century studies, nineteenth-century studies, New Religious Movements, Western esotericism, and mysticism studies.

After continuously operating as a graduate school program for religious training and scholarship across 150 years in four successive locations in Boston and recently Berkeley and known variously as the New Church Theological School, the Swedenborg School of Religion, and the Swedenborgian House of Studies, the school became the Center for Swedenborgian Studies as an affiliate center of the GTU on July 1, 2015.

THE PURPOSE AND MISSION OF THE CENTER FOR SWEDENBORGIAN STUDIES:

The Center for Swedenborgian Studies is a welcoming and inclusive community of learners at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California. Guided by the Bible as our sacred text and the theological insights of Emanuel Swedenborg, CSS provides scholarship, training for spiritual leaders, and engagement with emerging trends in society. Our perspective on the future informs our attention to the need for social transformation of society and the world, the need for interior transformation in individuals, and the dynamic interface between the two.

The Mission of the Center for Swedenborgian Studies is:

• to prepare qualified individuals for ministry in the Swedenborgian Church and world
• to serve as a center on the leading edge of Swedenborgian scholarship
• to share its resources of scholarship, leadership, and people with the wider church and community

Three scholars comprise the current faculty team: Rebecca K. Esterson, Dean of CSS, Associate Professor in Sacred Texts and Traditions, and Dorothea Harvey Professor of Swedenborgian Studies; Devin Phillip Zuber, Assistant Professor of American Studies, Religion, and Literature and George F. Dole Professor of Swedenborgian Studies; and James F. Lawrence, CSS Dean Emeritus and Director of the Doctor of Ministry Program at Pacific School of Religion. Adjuncts and visiting scholars add to the faculty on a regular basis.