# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1950_S194
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

194 SEMINARIES AND COLLEGES

pensable that the senior college curriculum yield a high 3
degree of competence in the use of the English language
_ and a working competence in certain ancient and classical
languages and in modern German. .
5. Since religion, whether as something to be learned or ag
something to be taught, is a system of ideas, and since jt r
is a system of ideas which must exist, not in a vacuum, but
in relation to other ideas, and since its ideas and its rela.
tionships to other ideas can be comprehended, not by the,>
peripheral organs of sense, but only by the thought proc
esses of the mind, it appears necessary that the senior co]
lege curriculum provide at least a reasonable foundation ;
philosophy.
6. Since the minister is, of course, a teacher, and since he may. =:
have a responsibility for other teachers, it is proper that =
the curriculum provide a basic appreciation of education,
at least from the historical point of view.
7. Since the individual differences of students are natural, in
the sense of being created, and since these differences place.
the individual differently in the social organism in view of:
which they were created, it is necessary not only to recog-
nize differences in aptitudes and interests, but also to en-'
courage some development along different paths of com-.
petence. Since all of these paths must, however, lie within
the general area of the ministry, it does not appear to be
desirable in the senior college to place more than incidental
emphasis upon the pursuit of studies calculated to develop
differentiating competences or to provide more than a
limited range of opportunity for curriculum differentiation,
Furthermore, economic as well as educational considera<
tions virtually compel Synod to confine the elective possi- {5
bilities of senior college curriculum to an extension of only.
a few of those fields of subject matter which in some meas;
ure are already included in the curriculum as requiregy'

If Synod finds it possible to approve these basic assumpti
and aims, then the Board will be prepared to construct a senit
college curriculum on the basis of such approval.

Spiritual Growth: a Major Function of the Senior College a
“Since the senior college has been authorized by Synod as
additional unit in its ministerial training program, it must be
sumed that the senior college will not. at all be regarded as