The Graduate Diploma in Ministry aims to develop competence in the practice of ministry. While the Graduate Certificate allows the development of facets of one's ministry, the Graduate Diploma is more comprehensive, encouraging reflection on the whole of one's ministry, especially through participation in the four practica. Building on foundational work completed at graduate certificate level and/or through an undergraduate degree in theology, the Graduate Diploma in Ministry provides students with the opportunity to continue, at a more advanced level, their critical reflections on the nexus between ministry and theology, their own ministry praxis, and ways of enhancing their own ministry.
The course caters for two main groups of students: (a) those who wish to extend the knowledge and skills acquired in their earlier studies in theology and ministry but have no immediate plans to continue beyond the Graduate Diploma in Ministry, and (b) those who will continue on to more advanced studies in ministry at masters level and beyond. For both groups of students, the kinds of generic skills identified in the rationale for the Graduate Certificate in Ministry and under Specialised Professional Skills continue to be refined, with increasing emphasis being placed on:
As the second in a sequence of postgraduate courses providing successively more advanced studies in ministry, the underlying purpose of the Graduate Diploma in Ministry is to support the attainment of outcomes implicit in the overall rationale for the BCT's postgraduate courses in ministry. This means that for students proceeding from the Graduate Certificate in Ministry or the Bachelor of Theology (or equivalent) to the Graduate Diploma in Ministry, their academically rigorous engagement with the discipline of ministry intensifies as they continue to