THE BARNABAS VENTURE

The need for faculty members in evangelical schools of theology in French Africa greatly exceeds the number of well-trained people. Moreover, even at the current rate of training it would take hundreds of years to fill the gap. It is therefore the conviction of the Barnabas Venture that training faculty needs to take place on African soil. Here are some reasons:
(1) The growth in the number of Christians in Africa who need training at all levels (lay and clergy) has outpaced the church's ability to provide qualified teachers.
(2) The training of doctoral candidates in Africa will increase the number of qualified professors who have done research which is sensitive to the needs of the African church.
(3) The training of Africans in the West leads to a considerable brain drain (when some fail to return to Africa) and to the upheaval of families who have to deal with culture shock.
Bangui Evangelical School of Theology has now actively addressed this problem for French-speaking Africa. The new doctoral program in Systematic Theology has been spearheaded by Dr. Isaac Zokoue, former principal of BEST, with the aid of Dr. Benno van den Toren (Dean of Faculty, Wycliffe Hall, Oxford). The Barnabas Venture was the first Western organization to help subsidize this doctoral program. As a result, the director of the Barnabas Venture was invited to attend a Consultation for Faculty Development and Pastoral Training for Theological Institutions in Africa held at Nairobi Evangelical Graduate School of Theology in August, 2007.
In addition to a major subsidy of the program, the Barnabas Venture has invited the doctoral students to Canada for research purposes and has made its new residence at 39 Laurel Valley Ct. available to them. In addition, the Barnabas Venture hopes to host African professors during their research sabbaticals, in order to encourage post-doctoral research and writing. Only when faculty members are also researchers themselves can they adequately supervise their doctoral students. The purpose of the research trip to Canada is to make available more adequate library resources than what are available in Bangui and to put doctoral students in touch with other qualified mentors in their field. The Barnabas Venture is proud to announce that Wycliffe College, Toronto, has joined in this invitation of doctoral students and post-doctoral researchers. Now, thanks to Wycliffe College's cooperation, our visitors will have access to the vast resources of the combined libraries of the University of Toronto and Toronto School of Theology.
We have already invited Dieudonné Djoubairou and Abel Ngarsoulédé, the inaugural students in the doctoral program at BEST and hope for their arrival in the Spring (Djoubairou) and Summer (Ngarsoulédé) of 2008.