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How Would We Know? Assessing Personal and Spiritual Formation in Clergy and Church Leadership
Description: Using a case study drawn from research across theological schools, this workshop explores how to assess pastoral formation. Participants will strengthen the questions guiding their evaluation efforts, consider what evidence of formation they hope to see, and gain resources for advancing assessment conversations in their own contexts.
Keywords: assessment; character formation; clergy formation; educational assessment; formation assessment; Graduating Student Questionnaire; intercultural competence; personal formation; seminarian formation; spiritual formation; spiritual maturity; student development; theological education
Assessing Student Formation: A New Set of Core Assessment Tools
The definitive introduction to the Seminary Formation Assessment (SFA)—a 50-item suite of assessments measuring spiritual dwelling, seeking, struggle, and emotion regulation in seminarians.
KEYWORDS: open access / free access; assessment instrument; Colloquy article; emotion regulation; psychometrics; Relational Spirituality Model (RSM); Seminary Formation Assessment (SFA); seminary students; sense of community; spiritual dwelling; spiritual formation; spiritual seeking; theological education; training resources; virtues
Spiritual Formation among Students at Christian Seminaries: Mature Alterity, Symptoms, and Well-Being
Person-centered analysis using the Relational Spirituality Model (RSM) identifies four seminary student subgroups, with "regulated seekers" showing mature alterity, flourishing, and stable balanced spirituality over time.
KEYWORDS: open access / free access; flourishing; mature alterity; mixture modeling; relational spirituality; spiritual formation
Latent Profiles of Seminary Students' Perceptions of Sense of Community amidst the COVID-19 Pandemic
Mixture modeling of 867 seminary students during COVID-19 identifies three sense-of-community subgroups (strongly connected, moderately connected, disaffected) with distinct well-being and spirituality profiles.
KEYWORDS: open access / free access; flourishing; mixture modeling; relational spirituality; sense of community; well-being
The Biobehavioral Family Model with a Seminarian Population: A Systems Perspective of Clinical Care
Structural equation modeling applies the Biobehavioral Family Model to seminarians, finding higher rates of anxiety and depression than the general population and supporting systemic clinical care.
KEYWORDS: open access / free access; anxiety; Biobehavioral Family Model; depression; family; health; relationships; seminarians; seminary students
The Impact of Financial Health on the Spiritual, Mental, and Relational Health of Christian Graduate Students
DESCRIPTION: Financial stress can affect seminary students across multiple dimensions of well-being, including spiritual, mental, and relational health. Using data from 189 students at five theological seminaries, this study examines whether spiritual health helps explain how financial stress relates to broader health outcomes. Structural equation modeling found that spiritual health accounted for part of the negative relationship between financial stress and both mental and relational health. The authors suggest that supporting students’ spiritual health may be an important component of interventions aimed at improving the holistic well-being of seminarians facing financial strain.
KEYWORDS: financial health; financial stress; holistic health; mental health; relational health; seminary students; spiritual health; student debt; student well-being; theological education
Experiential Avoidance Mediates the Relationship between Prayer Type and Mental Health before and through the COVID-19 Pandemic
DESCRIPTION: This longitudinal study examines how different types of prayer relate to anxiety, depression, and burnout among 564 seminary students from 17 theological schools. Colloquial, liturgical, and meditative prayer predicted lower experiential avoidance, which in turn was associated with fewer mental health symptoms; petitionary prayer showed no significant direct or indirect effects. The findings suggest that prayer practices may contribute to spiritual and character formation partly by helping seminarians remain engaged with difficult thoughts and emotions rather than avoiding them, with implications for student formation, mentorship, and well-being.
KEYWORDS: anxiety; burnout; character formation; COVID-19; depression; experiential avoidance; mental health; prayer; psychological flexibility; seminarians; spiritual formation; spiritual practices; student well-being
The Experience of Financial Well-Being, Shame, and Mental Health Outcomes in Seminary Students
DESCRIPTION: Financial hardship can affect seminary students in ways that extend beyond material strain. Drawing on a sample of 189 graduate students from ATS-accredited seminaries, this study examines relationships among financial well-being, shame, depression, anxiety, and spiritual well-being. The findings show that lower financial well-being was associated with greater shame, which in turn mediated relationships between financial distress and depression, anxiety, and spiritual well-being. The authors suggest that shame may be an important mechanism for understanding the broader psychological and spiritual effects of financial hardship and student debt among seminarians.
KEYWORDS: anxiety; depression; financial distress; financial well-being; mental health; seminary students; shame; spiritual well-being; student debt; student well-being