Our History

Bangor Theological Seminary

A Long and Distinguished History

The BTS Center traces its roots all the way back to 1814, with the founding of Bangor Theological Seminary. The charter for the school, initially incorporated as the Maine Charity School, was granted by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1814, six years prior to Maine statehood. The first classes were held in Hampden, Maine in October 1816, the campus moved to Bangor in 1819, and the first class graduated in 1820.

A private, independent, non-profit religious institution in the Congregational / United Church of Christ tradition, the Seminary was always ecumenical and open to people of diverse religious experience. Bangor Theological Seminary granted degrees including Bachelor of Divinity (B.Div.), Master of Divinity (M.Div.), Master of Theological Studies (M.T.S.), Master of Arts (M.A.), and Doctor of Ministry (D.Min.). Seminary graduates went on to serve congregations throughout New England and beyond, and the school also became a launching pad for missionaries worldwide.

After several decades of declining student enrollment — a result of the changing religious landscape in New England and the changing economics of higher education — the Trustees of the Seminary made the difficult decision to close its doors, to suspend classes and cease awarding degrees, following its final commencement in June 2013. Before its closure, Bangor was the third oldest seminary in the country — only Princeton and Andover Newton were older — and the only accredited graduate school of religion in Northern New England.

The seeds of the Seminary were planted in 1811 when members of the Society for Theological Education — most notably founding trustees Kiah Bayley, John Sawyer, and early alumnus, Jotham Sewall — set out to establish a school, “to procure for pious young men a collegiate education in order that they may be prepared for the Gospel ministry.” ¹

Throughout its two centuries of service, Bangor Theological Seminary was singularly focused on its mission, from its earliest days until its closing in 2013. As Calvin Clark notes in History of Bangor Theological Seminary (Boston: The Pilgrim Press, 1916), Bangor Theological Seminary was, in many ways, a school on the frontier. While other seminaries were started in highly-Christianized, relatively well-to-do parts of the United States, Bangor was “planted in a territory which had been fought over by contending powers for two centuries, on the outer edge of civilization, almost literally in the wilderness.” ²

It was in this place, a land of “spiritual desolation”³ with few people and even fewer communities of faith, that the country’s first-ever missionary seminary was planted. As Daniel Pike, a Seminary Trustee, wrote in 1827,

[The Seminary has] the special design, by the education of an older class of pious young men, to provide ministers of good abilities, ardent piety, and competent, if not the most refined education, for the numerous destitute churches and congregations of this state, and particularly in this section of it. ⁴

Throughout its history, Bangor Seminary’s mission was grounded in a commitment to place — both northern Maine in general and the Bangor area specifically — starting from when one of the first Trustees, Eliashib Adams, “took [his] blanket and provisions on [his] back and explored a tract of land on the Piscataquis in search of a resting for the contemplated school” in 1811.

The Seminary’s mission was also grounded in its commitment to parish leadership for small, rural church settings. Bangor was more or less completely uninterested in training polished scholars for the Academy. With a few exceptions, its professors were not notable scholars. In fact, during the first hundred years, most came from local churches and returned to local churches once they left the Seminary.

As Warren Moulton said during his inauguration as President of the Seminary in 1925,

“Through the years one increasing purpose runs, a purpose that is in no way denominational, ecclesiastical, creedal, dogmatic, or controversial, but wholly missionary, an overmastering desire to equip spiritual leaders for needy fields.” ⁵

Finally, and perhaps most notably, the Seminary’s mission was grounded in its unwavering commitment to a very specific group of people. By intention, its students were not aspiring scholars, but rather “earnest men of limited means.” ⁶ If you were too poor, too old, or too uneducated for other seminaries to admit you, Bangor Theological Seminary would find a place.

The Seminary made a point of accepting students who would not have qualified for admission in other theological schools through its longstanding “Open Door” policy, which explicitly stated that an undergraduate degree was not necessary for admission. When systems for theological education became more formalized in the early 20th century, the Seminary ensured that students without a formal education would have an educational on-ramp to theological education through a one- or two-year preparatory program, which allowed students to get an undergraduate and a theological degree concurrently.

Eventually formalized in 1938 as the Bangor Plan, this pathway was particularly significant for veterans coming home from World War II. When enrolled in the Bangor Plan — also known as the “two plus three plus two plan” — a student could study for two years in the liberal studies program, enter the M.Div. program, and once that was completed, work as a minister while finishing the undergraduate degree. In 1980, 60 percent of BTS students were on the Bangor Plan.

The leaders of Bangor Theological Seminary held firmly to these commitments — to place, to ministry in small rural churches, and to making theological education accessible for all — even though this path led to an almost unending series of existential crises, especially for the first one hundred years of its existence. As historian Walter Cook notes, “The seminary has never been in easy circumstances, it has never lived far from the line of great need, if not of real poverty of financial resources.” ⁷In fact, the school nearly closed in 1830, 1832, 1840, 1860, 1880, and 1897 due to lack of money or enrollment. Financial issues nearly led them to abandon the city of Bangor in 1829 and then again in 1920. They nearly merged with Andover Newton in 1860 and with Bowdoin College in 1897 and 1910.

For more than 100 years, the Seminary’s Convocation attracted some of the most widely acclaimed theologians and scholars. Held annually beginning in 1905, Convocation brought together scholars and preachers and musicians for a full week of education and inspiration. Each year people would travel by boat and rail, by carriage and by foot, to make their way to Bangor, and at night, those who had traveled would sleep on the gymnasium floor.

In the 1990s, the Bangor Plan began to decline because the Association of Theological Schools began to permit any school of theology to allow 10 percent of their students to begin M.Div. studies without Bachelors’ degrees. In an effort to bolster enrollment, Bangor Seminary launched a new initiative in 1991, entitled “A School In Three Places,” opening additional campuses with course offerings in Portland, Maine and Hanover, New Hampshire, linked through online platforms. In 1998, the Hanover campus closed, but courses continued on the Portland campus through 2013. Bangor Seminary became a hub for progressive theology by the 2000s. In 2005, in an effort to downsize and to enhance financial sustainability, the Bangor campus property was sold, and classes and offices moved to the Husson University campus. Due to declining enrollment, the Bangor Plan was suspended in 2006, and in 2013, following its final Commencement Ceremony, the Seminary closed its doors.

That same year, The BTS Center was born. Today, in a time of immense challenge for faith communities and faith leaders, The BTS Center carries on the Seminary’s historic, chartered educational mission by offering theologically grounded programs of continuing education and spiritual / vocational formation, including learning communities and cohorts, workshops and retreats, reading groups, public conversations and rituals, and projects of applied research. Inspired by the vision of human hearts renewed, justice established, and creation restored, today The BTS Center seeks to catalyze spiritual imagination with enduring wisdom for transformative faith leadership. Since 2020, The BTS Center’s programs center around the intersection of spiritual leadership and the climate crisis. In 2021, The BTS Center introduced a new logo and the organizational tagline “Spiritual leadership for a climate-changed world.”

Every day we, who lead The BTS Center, pause to remember the sacred responsibility that has been entrusted to this organization. We follow in a long line of faithful servants — scholars, administrators, spiritual leaders, students, Trustees, donors, and partnering congregations — who cared deeply about the mission of Bangor Theological Seminary and stewarded this institution as faithfully as they could, even through periods of great challenge. Now the responsibility is ours: to carefully and prayerfully steward the rich legacy, the mission and vision, and the assets of The BTS Center, with gratitude for our roots that are more than two centuries deep, and with our eyes and our hearts open to the urgent challenges of our day and the sacred calling that lies ahead. We are grateful for your support and encouragement as we press forward in faith.

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