Investing in Candler has never been easier. You can make an annual gift, create or support an endowed fund, and invest in scholarships. You also may invest in Candler with a bequest or life income gift, which can provide for you and your family, create tax benefits, and leave an important legacy for education, research, or community service at Candler.
Funding Priorities
Alumni and friends who invest in Candler are helping the school build upon its clear strengths in educating active religious leaders and first-rate scholars. Your gifts help Candler lead with wisdom, clarity, compassion and tolerance the urgent conversations among the streams of Christianity and with other religions of the world.
Candler School of Theology strives to meet the financial needs of students in a variety of ways. Candler scholarships come from several sources, including:
- income from endowed scholarship funds
- annual gifts directed to scholarship programs
- Candler School of Theology’s operating funds
Giving Opportunities
Some endowment gifts include naming opportunities.
- Candler Advantage endowed scholarships and stipends: $100,000
- Theology School Fund for Excellence (annual fund): any amount
With expertise across the spectrum from the classical to the practical fields, Candler faculty members strive to enhance the quality of religious and public life. Your gift will create endowed professorships to recruit and support the best faculty, scholars who strengthen Candler’s commitment to serve Christ by educating faithful and creative leaders for the church’s ministries in the world.
Endowed gifts to Candler ensure support for today and far into the future. Endowed professorship gifts are guaranteed through named endowment funds, and a major portion of the interest income provides financial support as outlined in the gift agreement. The remainder of the interest income is returned to the fund’s corpus to protect against inflation and permit the endowment to grow over time. In this way, endowed gifts have far greater earning power: A one-time gift lasts forever.
Giving Opportunities
The following giving levels are accompanied by naming opportunities.
- Endowed Distinguished Professorship: $3 million
- Minister in Residence Endowment: $1 million
- Endowed Faculty Scholar: $750,000
- Endowed Lecture Series: $250,000 OR Non-Endowed Lecture Series: $50,000
Initiatives in denominational studies, religious practices, contextual education, and the faith lives of today’s youth strengthen Candler’s curriculum. Your gift will allow for the enhancement of these programs, ensure a strong student affairs program, and fill our facilities with international representations of Christian art.
Giving Opportunities
Annual and endowment gifts are needed to support these program endowments which may be established with a minimum gift of $100,000
Anglican Studies Program
For those seeking ordination, formation for priesthood is based on a program centered on collegial reflection on student placements in carefully supervised Episcopal parishes and enriched by the weekly celebration of the Eucharist and the preparation of the proper Scripture lessons appointed for the week. Episcopal formation also includes ecumenical education in general theological studies, special academic work concentrating in liturgical studies, theology in the Episcopal tradition, worship from the Book of Common Prayer, and regular training in the spiritual practices of the priesthood.
Baptist Studies Program
Baptist students at Candler come from all the major branches of the Baptist family: Alliance of Baptists, American Baptists, Cooperative Baptists, the National Baptist Conventions, Progressive Baptists, and Southern Baptists–not to mention smaller Baptist groups. In addition to the core classes, the Baptist Studies Program includes opportunities for Baptist students to get to know one another and work together, typically in conjunction with a Baptist faculty member.
Black Church Studies Program
Candler’s Program of Black Church Studies prepares men and women to provide learned, prophetic, and compassionate leadership in black and multiracial churches; and, educates the entire Candler community about the origins, development, and contemporary diversity of the black church tradition. The program also explores religious traditions among peoples of African descent across Africa and the diaspora. The program seeks to integrate black church studies into foundational courses at Candler and to expand and deepen black church studies courses.
Contextual Education Program
Contextual Education combines academic instruction with opportunities for formation in ministry and leadership in churches, social service agencies, hospitals and other clinical and social settings. Candler’s unique commitment to contextual theology and theological education is formalized through the four-semester sequence, Contextual Education I and Contextual Education II, required for all MDiv students.
Methodist Studies Program
The Methodist studies program promotes the ethos of the Wesleyan heritage through course offerings and programs for United Methodists and the Pan Methodist community. The director of Methodist studies coordinates course offerings in United Methodist history, doctrine, and polity that meet the requirements for ordination set forth in The Book of Discipline of The United Methodist Church.
Women, Theology and Ministry Program
Candler’s Women, Theology and Ministry program prepares women to provide transformative leadership in the church and the broader community. The program seeks to fulfill this purpose through assisting in vocational discernment and development of professional identity and leadership abilities, fostering an intellectual community for women students and alumnae, encouraging creative and constructive scholarship about women and religion, and advocating for women’s issues in the church and world.
Youth Theological Initiative
Since 1993, YTI has been a center for research and the theological education of youth and youth ministers. The YTI Summer Academy gathers about 40 rising high school seniors from across the country to Emory University for a three-week experience in Christian theological education. Our goal is to cultivate public theologians for the church and world and foster opportunities to explore questions that shape us.
A welcoming community to international scholars and students alike, Candler seeks to strengthen the teaching-learning experience with international exchange programs and financial and program support for international students. Your gift will ensure that Candler fully engages the world of the Christian faithful.
Giving Opportunities
Scholarship endowments may be established with a minimum gift of $100,000. Program endowments may be established with a minimum gift of $100,000. The amounts listed below are for full endowments.
- Endowed directorship, international program: $2.5 million
- Endowed international exchange program: $1 million
- Endowment for international students: $500,000
- Endowment for faculty international travel: $200,000