The Seminary
of The Christian Community in North America
A Short History of the Seminary
Since 1922, a movement for the renewal of the religious life has been steadily growing around the world. With the help of the spiritual scientist Rudolf Steiner, a group of 45 women and men formed the original founding circle of a renewed priesthood. Not theological erudition nor ancient tradition was the foundation for this movement, but a living experience of the newly dawning presence of Christ Jesus in our time.
Beginnings
In 1922, a group of individuals gathered at the Independent School for Spiritual Science in Dornach, Switzerland, for the founding events of the new movement for religious renewal. There, at this new building dedicated to the renewal of mystery knowledge with the Christ-Mysteries at its center, they received the guidance and help they sought from its architect, Rudolf Steiner. There, at this place of a new schooling in our humanity, they experienced a first vision of what could be part of a new seminary training for the future of Christianity.
1933 - 2003
Right at the moment of the rise of one of the most destructive, anti-human powers the world has ever seen, the Seminary of The Christian Community opened the doors of its first building dedicated to the training of priests in the movement for religious renewal. As Adolf Hitler proclaimed himself the “Führer” (Leader/Guide), students gathered daily to hear words spoken in the sanctuary, from the altar, from the true “helfende Führer” (helping guide). Banned by the Nazi’s in 1941, Emil Bock - one of the founding priests and main teachers at the seminary - worked on a whole new translation of the New Testament while in the prison camp in Welzheim, including Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians and the Letter to the Hebrews. This spiritual work, completed under the pressures of a time of terrible catastrophe and real evil, became a powerful force that emerged above-ground at the end of the war in 1945. Bock’s herculean efforts in the realm of esoteric biblical history - along with Friedrich Rittelmeyer’s work in Christian meditation and prayer and Rudolf Frieling’s clear and deep contemplations of the Old and New Testament - laid the groundwork for the way forward. By 2001, a new, second seminary was opened in Hamburg, Germany, and priests were ordained and worked on all seven continents.
A group of students with Seminary Director Bastiaan Baan.
Richard Dancey with his wife, Margaret Dancey.
Richard Dancey at the Seminary in Chicago.
Bastiaan Baan, Seminary Director 2011-2019
Gisela Wielki, Founding Priest of the Seminary of North America, 2003-2015
Seminary in Chicago
The world-wide movement made an important leap when it decided to open up an English-language priest-training outside of central Europe. In the Autumn of 2003, the doors of the Seminary in North America were opened in the heartland of the United States — Chicago, Illinois.
Rev. Gisela Wielki was its dedicated director and worked with Rev. Oliver Steinrueck, the coordinator (Lenker) for North America, as well as with the local priest in Chicago, Richard Dancey, to guide it through its first years. Richard, one of the most gifted pastors we have had, brought his extraordinary earnestness and deep love of the word to the work. Gisela, with her living, artistic perceptiveness, led the students into a new way of looking at the world. This looking leads us to look at ‘things’ with our eyes in a way that they begin to be transparent to their eternal ‘being’. This sacramental gaze is essential to the future of Christianity.
Spring Valley to Toronto
After moving to Spring Valley, NY, to be nearer to support teachers and staff - as well as a larger experience of a student community - the seminary took another big step in its story through the leadership of Bastiaan Baan. Bastiaan brought a deep and devoted inner practice of prayer and meditation into the culture of the seminary, centering the training in the region of the heart. He also expanded the administrative support for the seminary, enabling it to expand and enhance its programs.
In 2016, Jonah Evans, Patrick Kennedy, and Julia Polter were tasked by the world-wide leadership with the work of envisioning the next phase of the life of the Seminary in North America. This vision was developed together through reflection, research, conversation, and prayer. Not only was every aspect of the curriculum and training path reconsidered, but the practical necessities for more facilities and more than one director became clear. In the summer of 2019, the seminary moved to the greater Toronto area in Ontario, Canada, to fulfill this aspect of the vision. With a building with dedicated classrooms and offices, the availability of four priests in the congregation, and the most cosmopolitan city in the world, a location was found that can provide a healthy foundation for this next, third phase of the training’s development.
There are approximately 200 independent Christian Community congregations worldwide, with 14 congregations in North America. Services are also held through visits to branch congregations in more than twenty five additional locations.
Priesthood in The Christian Community
Since the beginning of The Christian Community, women and men have entered the priesthood on an equal basis.
Priesthood in The Christian Community—while working soundly in the physical world—seeks to live into the depths of the Christian mystery and its enactment through and with Christ for the transformation of human culture and the earth. It is a vocation of building bridges between the sensory and supersensory—a vocation with the task of healing the split between knowledge and faith, which has driven such a disastrous wedge between intellectual knowing and the wisdom of the heart.
There was a time when human beings looked solely to the gods and to those who represented them on earth in order to understand themselves and their place and role in creation. It was the age of Theo-sophia and Theo-logia: “wisdom of the divinity” and “knowledge of the divinity.” As human beings became more independent of the spiritual world and entered the stage of individualized thinking, this central pursuit became Philo-sophia: “love of wisdom”— love of the same wisdom that had formerly been a direct experience, but which must now be grasped in clear thought-forms.
Today, human beings are called upon to reconnect to the divinity out of their own freedom and inner activity. This divine knowledge, this wisdom, has now to be found within the human being. In order to apprehend the meaning of our existence, of the unfolding of our destiny and the destinies of those around us, people today will have to observe themselves and each other ever more attentively. Anthropo-sophia — “wisdom of the human being”—is the key to this enhanced attention and observation.
The Seminary of The Christian Community in North America is now located in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) of Ontario, Canada, offering a full complement of programs for students on various paths of study.
