The New Brunswick Theological Seminary Warren L. Dennis Annual Metro-Urban Lecture Series is intended to help revitalize the study and practice of urban ministry in theological education in North America.

Programs for urban ministry in theological education have often focused on specific skills or strategies that define cities in terms of their deficiencies. Cities have been seen as places of poverty, violence and oppression that are in need of outside intervention in the form of missions or evangelism. The work of churches, other religious institutions, communities and the broader context of urban life (corporations, financial institutions, hospitals, entertainment, legal systems and law enforcement, universities, transportation system, etc.) have too often been ignored in these educational models. As a result, many of the traditional approaches to urban ministry in theological education have become increasingly ineffective.

Institutions of theological education must establish an urban ministry body of knowledge that connects faculty, students and pastors to the systemic realities and challenges faced in our inner city neighborhoods. The Warren L. Dennis Metro-Urban Lecture Series will strive to develop new models for urban learning and leadership training, and to provide new resources for teaching urban ministry in theological education that reflect more inclusive concerns and commitments. The lecture series will challenge seminaries to assume greater public responsibility for helping urban congregations and other private and not-for-profit institutions shape the character of effective urban ministry in this new century.