I love thoughtful conversations, especially with our family. As part of the "side conversation" related to one of my emerging church posts, our son offered an intersting theory on why the church is so often ineffective. It relates to the training of pastors. Remember - he may not have taken Greek but he did survive seminary : -) as a pastors kid.

     one part of my theory goes back to education and the kind of people that are teaching and training
     those who are then going into ministry.  my real world vs. campus critters thing.  since the modern
     american college (Christian or otherwise) is little more than a jobs program for people who cant
     hack it in the real world - are seminaries any different?  people teaching evangelism who have never
     had a job outside of a safety bubble?!  can someone train soldiers because they have mastered
     halo 3 online? this is where the problem begins i think.  I maintain my idea that nobody should be
     hired to a ministry or parachurch organization much less a pastoral leadership position without
     having spent at least 2 years working in a secular setting.  I don't care if its waiting tables or
     leading in a corporate boardroom.  Christians are only effective if they can be surrounded by pagans
     as they are and respond to the way they live, act, walk, and talk without making faces

I think he may be on to something. I couldn't think of a response to his Halo 3 analogy. Are seminaries training church leaders adequately - or do they need to add requiremenets that relate to the real world?

What do you think?