Perique69

PhD in religion? Be careful out there. It's so tough to land a job.

Yes!

Ask yourself why you feel so compelled to be gratified by some silly professor? 99.9% of them are little more than ventriloquists who spend their careers idolizing their favorite thinkers.

This thread's low turnout is interesting, indeed. It just doesn't make much sense to pour into a religion PhD only to end up in a market offering about 1 job for every 100 graduates (at best). Compare this ratio to newly minted psychiatrists who cherry pick from approximately 50 job offers per individual. Even if the "prestigious" religion PhD lands a job, the salary is so meager that canned baked beans soon become costly. Meanwhile, lowly nurse practitioners, physician assistants, and IT folks command salaries well over $100k with a fraction of the education and debt of a religion PhD. Resist the narcissistic institutions who keep irresponsibly offering degrees requiring years to earn but deliver such figuratively and literally paltry returns. Walk away. Clear your dewy eyes and become something of which Thomas Paine would be proud.

I'd go with Boston. No question. There is no good reason to incur debt for theology / religion degrees.

Thanks! I'm excited. Not a joke post as some seemed to have thought.

Accepted to Emory, Bob Jones, Princeton U, and an online program (Capella) so far. PhD in NT except for the online program. Really waiting to hear from Regent and Harvard.

Only raging masochists incur debt for a PhD in religion. $180,000 for Oxford is just insane considering the degree won't be worth much more than $40k per year salary.

MarXian, great point about the subjective element. Many refuse to believe such a force plays a role in admissions decision making. But it plays a larger role than most realize.

Personally, I would not incur any amount of debt for any master-level degree in religion especially the purely academic degrees. There simply is no reliable job market for these degrees without a PhD.

7 plus years is the norm for PhD programs (especially religion) in America. It's not unusual for some to take 10 or more years. The most focused and effective can finish in 5 or 6 years, but that's rare. Why 7 years? The combination of coursework, language exams, comprehensive exams and dissertation require A LOT of time. Most don't even begin the dissertation until year 4.

Not at all. Just doing my part to clear the clouds on the reality of careers in teaching religion, etc.

A degree in math from an elite liberal arts school? Be aware that your math degree holds far more earning potential than any degree in religion or philosophy. Read philosophy of religion for fun, and get a real job with your math degree. Read this in 20 years if you go the religion route then you'll say, damn, perique69 was right on the money.

MarXian, yes, you're right about my broad point that Kant is really important for understanding later figures, and even earlier figures to a degree. He is that pervasive. End of story. Joseph is miles down a rabbit trail regarding my posts. That's about all I can say. Besides, isn't an MPhil a one year advanced degree that presupposes at least 2 years of higher level coursework in philosophy? I know this is the case at Cambridge. I'm not sure why the OP seems to want a very basic intro to philosophical theology.

For the OP, check out F. Beiser's The Fate of Reason, which is a great general history of the period between Kant and Fichte. The Cambridge Texts in the History of Philosophy series are well worth your time. Be well acquainted with Augustine's Confessions and Descartes' Meditations as precursors to Kant's Critique. (Hint: Confessions is NOT a spiritual autobiography.)

If you knew me, you'd be awfully embarrassed

Horrible advice, eh? Tell that to Robert Pippin at UChicago. Sure, read a survey or two, but know you're reading little more than a superficial, oversimplified gloss. Your advice is admittedly the norm, which is why many struggle to understand what on earth they think they're reading. I'll state it again for the OP, know Kant's conception of reason inside and out, and any subsequent authors will make much more sense. I'd rather know Kant and nothing whatsoever about 20th century figures because they pale in comparison. Arriving to the 20th century without the proper foundation (Kant) is pointless.

Well, they were blowing smoke to steer you in a different direction (for whatever reason). Vanderbilt is fine and surely has more funding.

I'd be sure to solidly understand Kant's first Critique (a monumental task) before tackling nearly any post-Kantian text. Otherwise, you'll be spinning wheels. Many jump right into the likes of Schleiermacher, Kierkegaard, Hegel, Nietzsche, Freud without first understanding Kant. As a result, they grossly misread these later birds and have never even heard of the more critical post-Kantians (e.g., Hamann, Fichte, Jacobi, and especially Reinhold). Avoid secondary sources, too.

It's tough to articulate what "religion and psychology" mean because both terms (alone) are so non-descriptive. From a "largely Christian focus" suffers from a similar lack of meaning, as well. It's way off to say Union faculty are not interested in "real world" applications. Ann Ulanov, who has lead their psychiatry and religion program for years, is a practicing psychoanalyst, like most faculty in this department. Union was put off by your focus on "mental health" (and depression and suicide) because it's too vague. It's like saying you're interested in the Bible, which is fine, but exactly what about that interests you? There's almost endless possibilities. Let me also say that presuming Freud is "dead and gone" is a sure sign that one has not read Freud, or any current psychoanalytic-minded scholarship, which very much includes "real world" applications.

It's the case at virtually every competitive school, but it's a matter of degree. HDS is considerably less this way compared to UChicago.

I taught there as a visiting prof recently. Don't get me wrong, it's obviously an excellent school. But some faculty and students overreach too often, making it more about competition than education.

UChicago is overrated, IMO. While it has some worthwhile people, too many are blowhards.

Admission requirements are basically the same across the board. Most UK programs don't require GRE scores, which attracts some Americans. I think Cambridge requires the GRE from Americans though. Funding is a bigger challenge than admission. It's tough for Americans to secure a fully-funded ride at UK programs. It is also difficult for Americans with UK doctorates to compete for jobs against graduates from American programs who have spent 7 or 8 or more years doing far more than independent research.

Yes, I was referring to the point about combing applications to fulfill a perception of a "rich, full class." It's a bad thing to the extent that a small group of people ultimately are "in charge," and call the shots. This ubiquitous, oligarchic practice used to work fairly well in terms of identifying the truly gifted (intellectual) candidates. As of late, the oligarchs shifted their criteria for admission, however. Consequently, historically "rigorous" religion and theology departments suffer from a surfeit of "professors" whose primary "skill" centers on telling their autobiography. Worse still, these "professors" conflate their story-telling selves with rigorous intellectualism. C'est la vie.