The members of the EAM-EDS Theological Education Committee are, L-R, Peter Ng, Elease Armstrong, Fred Vergara, Gale Yee, Kwok Pui Lan and Jim Kodera. Joanne Manning, and Joanne Manning, controller of EDS and administrator of scholarship funds, is also shown with the committee at far right.

With funding from the Constable Fund, the Episcopal Asiamerica Ministries (EAM) of the Missionary Society announces its Doctor of Ministry project at Episcopal Divinity School (EDS) in Cambridge, Massachusetts to be in full operation.

According to the Rev. Dr. Fred Vergara, missioner for EAM and Dr. Kwok Pui Lan, professor of theology and spirituality at EDS and serving as co-chairs of the EAM-EDS Theological Education Committee, the pilot project will fund almost 80% of full tuition fees of at an initial 12 applicants.

The committee announced that eligibility to the scholarship is open to Asiamerican clergy belonging to the Episcopal Church and churches which are in concordat of full communion with the Episcopal Church such as the Iglesia Filipina Independiente, the Mar Thoma Church, Church of South India, Church of North India and Evangelical Lutheran Church of America and Canada.

In an effort to cast a wider pool of applicants, the committee also extended eligibility to clergy belonging to the Anglican partner churches in Asia, such as the Philippines, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan, China and India, though they would have to be treated as international students.

The EAM-EDS Doctor of Ministry combines brief residential study and distance learning via the internet.  Designed for active clergy and working theologians, it is a professional degree that seeking to enhance the clergy as person, as minister and as theologian. Applicants need not leave their current jobs but relate them into their studies.

Meanwhile, two applicants who have enrolled in the program have already designed their dissertation relative to Asian history, Asiamerica ministry and Asiamerican theology. The Rev. Ada Wong Nagata from the Diocese of Los Angeles seeks to write on the history of Asiamerica Ministry and the challenges of Asian clergy in American context. The Rev. Thomas Eoyang Jr. from the Diocese of Pennsylvania hopes to write on the experiences of Asian Americans in the Episcopal Church.

Aside from Vergara and Kwok, the members of the committee are: Canon Peter Ng, partnership officer for Asia and the Pacific; the Rev. Dr. Jim Kodera, professor at Wellesley College and former chair of EAM Council; Dr. Gale Yee, professor of biblical studies at EDS; and the Rev. Elease White-Armstrong, director of recruitment and admissions at EDS.

For more information, contact: The Rev. Dr. Fred Vergara at wvergara@episcopalchurch.org