The Cost of Discipleship
The divinity school experience – the formation of faith, the rigors of study, the sense of purpose, the companionship, a lifetime of memories – includes an additional element for many students, the task of taking on debt. About half of Yale Divinity School’s nearly 400 students take out loans to support their education. This reflects a national average. The menu of lenders ranges
from private banks to the federal government. Most students choose a federal loan for its flexibility of repayment and, in some circumstances, eventual loan forgiveness.
The goal of freeing future students of academic debt is now a top priority of YDS. One aim is to raise $53 million in endowment funds for financial aid by 2022, the School’s 200th anniversary. This would allow YDS students to study without acquiring additional debt for tuition – and follow their vocational calls without severe financial worry.
Reflections asked a selection of students to share their thoughts on the challenge they face – the pursuit of ministry and service while managing the payment of their educational debts.
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Much to be Thankful For: Dante Tavolaro ’ 17 M.Div.
Deciding where I would go to seminary was one of the most difficult decisions my wife and I have had to make. As our discernment unfolded, the choice was clearly coming down to two schools – a denominational seminary or Yale Divinity School/Berkeley Divinity School. We wrote list after list: Which school would be the best place for my theological formation? Which community would be the best place to spend three years of our lives? The decision was an incredibly difficult one, and it felt nearly impossible because of one category: finances.
We could not ignore the fact that the denominational seminary had offered me a full-tuition scholarship. That meant I would have no academic debt, period, since I have no previous academic debt. Given the undergraduate and graduate school debt my wife has, this was a factor we could not ignore. Ultimately, though, we made our decision and arrived at YDS/ Berkeley in fall 2014.
Despite our initial uncertainty, it became clear that YDS/Berkeley was the right choice for us. This decision has come at a great financial cost. Though I receive a very generous YDS scholarship, which has increased each of my three years, and also receive a few denominational scholarships, I now carry a significant amount of academic debt. Combined with my wife’s debt, ours now totals somewhere north of $100,000. When we consider that I am about to be ordained in The Episcopal Church and she works for a higher education nonprofit, we cannot even begin to imagine a day when we will no longer be carrying this financial burden. As we prepare to leave New Haven, this is the greatest source of anxiety for our future. My wife and I are preparing to make further sacrifices so I can serve in the parish I feel called to serve – even if that means part-time employment on top of parish work. This is a likelihood we will face not just for my first call, but for years to come.
Nevertheless, I believe I have much to be thankful for. I am profoundly grateful to my wife who has made countless sacrifices for me to get the unbeatable theological education and formation I have received at YDS/Berkeley. I give thanks that I have a bishop who is incredibly supportive and willing to think creatively about my future. I am grateful to the generous donors of YDS/Berkeley, and all the outside sources of funding I have received, without which I would not have been able to study here. When the financial picture seems too overwhelming to handle, I lean into this source of gratitude for strength. Above all I know I must stay vigilant in trusting that God has called me to this work and that in the end, somehow, God will provide.
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Pray, Worry, Trust, Service: Jordan H. B. Rebholz ’18 M.Div.
I take a deep breath and say a little prayer at the beginning of every semester when they swipe my credit card in the bookstore, hoping that I calculated correctly and there is enough money in my account for all the required texts for the term. I have had to work the entire time I’ve been enrolled at Yale Divinity School just to make ends meet, and I let out a sigh of relief at the end of every semester, not because I’ve turned in all of my papers and taken my exams, but because I know I will have a little time before I must take out the next batch of loans.
Before I even arrived, I had already accrued student debt because it took me almost eight years to make my way through my undergraduate studies. I am at peace with that journey, but it was difficult to take on even more debt to be here. At this moment, I have over $80,000 in student loan debt, while my husband has over $60,000, and we both know that mine is only going to increase over the next academic year. This affects our hopes for the future and our everyday choices.
All I’ve ever wanted to do was serve others and be the person God wants me to be in the world, but I must admit that there are moments when I feel I’ve made a mistake answering my call. Despite these struggles, I choose to stay because I believe in people.
My story is not unusual. As vice president of YDS Student Council, I have been awarded a special look into the lives of other students. Like the feeding of the 5,000, I have seen students share textbooks to save money. I have seen students scrambling at the end of the semester to purchase food in the refectory, then gratefully discovering that the person ahead of them in line paid for their meal. We make it work in the best way we know how: by loving one another as we love ourselves. The act of trying to bring about the Kingdom of God is alive and well at Yale Divinity School.
What breaks my heart the most is knowing that the financial struggles of many of us will continue after we graduate. Yes, we will leave this place filled with knowledge, experience, and memories, but we will also take with us a debt that almost seems too large to repay. Some of us may have to take jobs we don’t want upon leaving, because the loan repayment bills will be arriving shortly. I worry about my friends. We have been taught by the Scriptures that we shouldn’t worry: “Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them” (Matthew 6:26). I am trying to trust this message and live into my calling to serve others every day.
I am here, and I choose to stay, because I trust in God. Even in my times of prayer and worry, I truly believe that we are all here for a specific reason. I pray that in the future, students at this institution and countless others won’t have to worry about how they will pay or repay for their time of learning. I pray that the world and churches will step up and assist these incredible people. I pray that someday our debts will be repaid, to our schools and our God.
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Vocational Passion and Eight part-time Jobs: Kevin A. McKoy ’17 M.Div.
I was raised by my mother and grandmother in one of Jamaica’s poorest and most violent communities. Today, I am the first of my matrilineal relatives to graduate from college and pursue graduate studies.
It is difficult to explain to my relatives my reason to seek a vocation in ministry, since there are many reasons to follow a career that would offer more substantial financial returns. I can only describe this embrace of theological education as a journey toward fulfilling my call to ministry. “Feed my sheep!” These words placed the burden of parish ministry and public witness on my heart, and so I decided to pursue a degree at Yale Divinity School.
I chose Yale because of its history of providing the world with transformational leaders. Another reason was the financial aid that Yale offers. I recall the joy I felt when I was notified that I was granted admission as well as a tuition scholarship. How much more difficult it would have been to follow my calling if not for the scholarship. Even with this, and with over $20,000 in student loans, I have worked more than eight part-time jobs here at YDS to survive financially.
The necessity of working those many jobs has inevitably limited some opportunities for formation at Yale. There might be many reasons for me to reconsider or renegotiate or defer this “call to ministry thing,” but I have never been more sure about it than now. The financial burden I bear cannot compare to the change I have seen in me. I am now completing the third and final year in the MM.Div. program, and I am convinced of my purpose and place in the world. I leave Yale committed to bringing forth the healing and hope of Christ to suffering humanity through a ministry rooted in hospitality and solidarity.
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Indebted to Gospel Truth: Justin Mikulencak ’17 M.Div.
Millennial borrowers grapple with the prospect of making monthly loan payments for decades, while politicians and talking heads dissect how the burden of $1.3 trillion in student loans has suppressed home ownership among younger people, delayed starting families, driven down retail spending, and a host of other consequences. These burdens, we’re told, stand as obstacles in the way of flourishing and prosperity, the freedom to pursue “the good life.”
My wife and I currently pay on her student loans and will begin to make payments on mine after graduation. Our total student loan debt, by the time I graduate in May, will be about two and a half times the minimum salary guaranteed for an ordained minister in my denomination. (Many church bodies do not offer the luxury of a minimum salary.) Such debt will undoubtedly affect our financial choices for many years to come.
Yet it is short-sighted to characterize the debt I have taken on to earn my M.Div. as primarily a burden on my ability to consume, spend, and participate in the modern economy. High levels of ministerial debt can lead to something much more troubling: It can erode or silence the church’s prophetic witness.
Certainly I want to be able to pay my bills and provide for my family – but ultimately much of the argument about the burdens of debt is rooted in the uncritical acceptance of an economic system that values material luxuries and preaches a “financial freedom” that merely invites more and more spending. This is the same system that both engenders and demonizes poverty, and casts the real needs of the exploited poor as … burdens. In my view, ministers and priests have a duty to preach and work against poverty, exploitation, discrimination, and other evils of this system rather than be assimilated into it via their debt.
A new pastor’s substantial student debt could discourage important ministries to the homeless and stifle prophetic criticism of wealth and power. A financially strapped minister might feel too vulnerable to speak freely, fearing an eventual loss of salary or standing. In some denominations, it is not uncommon for clergy who rock the boat to be reassigned to smaller churches that often struggle to pay their pastor a living wage. Could the daunting challenge of meeting one’s student loan payments and other financial obligations dissuade a pastor from proclaiming an uncomfortable vision of justice to a comfortable congregation? What if speaking truth to power included confronting the chair of the church council or the congregation’s biggest givers? Such leverage over the pastor and the pulpit could erode the duty to witness to God’s vision of justice in the world.
Such a problem is not easily solved, especially in mainline churches that are sometimes overly reliant upon numbers to tell them whether the church is succeeding or not.
Perhaps an answer lies in greater collaboration between church bodies and seminaries. One possibility: Reduce academic requirements for the M.Div. from three years to two, with the third year given over to full-time, paid training in the candidate’s denomination. One could complete denominational history and polity requirements, as well as get vital experience, through the denomination rather than through costly credit hours at school.
To be clear, this is not to downplay the importance of academics in ministerial training. I believe that clergy who lack acceptable academic preparation or intellectual rigor are just as susceptible to cultural captivity as those with high debt. Nevertheless, we must creatively rethink our models of theological education and ministerial preparation so they don’t foster uncritical assimilation, via debt, into modern popular culture or domesticate prophetic witness. Our burdens go beyond spending power and debt. Our call goes beyond making things easier or more comfortable. Let us find a more excellent way that empowers and sets free a prophetic vision in our communities, pulpits, and divinity schools.
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Frugality and Freedom: Emily J. García ’17 M.Div.
My parents were the first in their families to go to college, and they had to work while completing their degrees. My father worked at UPS when he was full-time in seminary, which means we often didn’t see him. As my mother has often said, “Having money is only good because of the freedom it gives you.” My parents further sacrificed that freedom when they became missionaries to Japan in the Evangelical Free Church, a role that required depending on the church for all finances.
We returned to the US when I was in second grade, and for a long time money was tight. But my parents wanted all three of us kids to be able to focus on our studies in a way they couldn’t, and so we didn’t have to get jobs in high school. Then they shouldered the college debt that our scholarships didn’t cover (and we all worked part-time in college). All this, compounded by caring for their parents and covering family illnesses, means that today my parents are still in debt.
Perhaps you’re a person whose family has, for generations, owned houses and gone to college. We had no safety net, no margin of error. We did not have grandparents, friends, cousins, or aunts who could chip in. We always knew we were close to the edge.
So when I felt called to the priesthood after I became Episcopalian, my parents expressed concern – not over theology but because they worried that the church would not take care of me, that I, too, would have to live without financial stability. My parents wanted me to have the freedom and security they had not found until much later.
The Episcopal Church has provided more institutional and financial support than my parents ever got. And because my parents had taken on my college debt, I was able to take a low-paid teaching job right after college (instead of something lucrative and unrelated to ministry), and later on my first unpaid church internship (but keeping two part-time jobs). At Yale I’ve lived frugally, working as many as three part-time jobs while taking classes full-time. I’ve spent time and energy each year applying for outside merit scholarships and interest-free loans – time spent at the expense of my homework. But the lessened debt was absolutely worth a slightly lower grade.
I’m convinced that this light(er) debt load makes it easier for me to serve God in the church. Some suggest it is unseemly for clergy to care about stable finances. But prudence is a virtue, right alongside generosity and courage. The prudence I learned from Ann and Ron Garcia, and from my priestly mentor, Steve White, will allow me to go about my work in the church with greater freedom from debt, which means more space in my mind and heart for what matters: serving others and going where God asks.
My first goal with my new job out of seminary is to help my parents pay off their own debt, so that they can feel free, too.