My sister recently decided to embark on a programme of studies for a divinity degree, beginning with a course on the Old Testament. She wrote to ask me why I decided to go to theological seminary in 1965. Here is what I answered (only slightly edited):
This is somewhat embarrassing. Oh well, here goes:
As an undergraduate in the early 1960s, I was a student radical (of sorts). I decided I wanted to help change the world, especially in the realm of civil rights. I figured people went to church because of social pressure and while they were in church I'd have a captive audience and could set them all straight about how the world should work. Yes, I was that arrogant.
Also, seminaries had financial aid available, and that certainly helped. I was accepted at both McCormick and Chicago Theological Seminary [CTS] but CTS was VERY active in civil rights (Jesse Jackson was a year ahead of me there, and the seminary became Martin Luther King's headquarters in the summer on 1966). They recruited me very actively despite my awful undergrad record, so I went there. I'm glad I did. It was a valuable part of my continuing emotional and intellectual growth.
Old Testament. I never took the courses! It was winter term my second year at CTS that the dean said I had to take the Old Testament courses, and I explained to him that actually I had decided I didn't want to stay in seminary. He was a kind man. I offered to relinquish my scholarship, but he said I could keep it; and he let me register through the seminary for more math and economics courses at the University of Chicago.
Old Testament. I never took the courses! It was winter term my second year at CTS that the dean said I had to take the Old Testament courses, and I explained to him that actually I had decided I didn't want to stay in seminary. He was a kind man. I offered to relinquish my scholarship, but he said I could keep it; and he let me register through the seminary for more math and economics courses at the University of Chicago.
Why did I leave seminary? I realized I didn't belong there.
In the summer after my first year, I started rereading economics and realized how much I liked it. I also started reading Milton Friedman (famous economist who had been criticized by all the east coast liberal elitist interventionist profs at Carleton College) and realized how much of what he said seemed right. But the crunch came one weekend when I was supposed to give a sermon at a small church on the near SW side of Chicago. I had the sermon written by Thursday and then started reading Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis. I don't know why; maybe I knew where I was and just needed a push.
By Saturday night I had finished the book. I set it down and said something like. "That's me. I'm just a hypocrite. I don't believe any of this stuff, at least not the way the people in that church will think I mean it. I've been using Rudolf Bultmann's notion of demythologizing to come to grips with everything I've been studying, but I've been demythologizing everyone else's demythologizations. I don't believe this stuff. I know it. I can't do this."
Somehow, I got through the sermon and church service the next day, but that was it.