There are degrees in religious studies and in various aspects of preparation for the ministry available online as well as in the classrooms of seminaries and Christian universities. If your interest is in comparative religion, you are better off exploring the options at a traditional university – which by next fall may be offering those courses online as well, given the pace with which traditional colleges are adopting distance learning.
There are several options offered by respected, accredited institutions. The bachelor’s degree programs generally mix a fairly broad choice of academic disciplines mixed in with classes on spirituality and on Christian theology. The result is a baccalaureate in Christian Ministry or in other cases, in Theology and Ministry.
Some schools are offering graduate degrees in the field as well. Liberty University has a mix of twenty two master’s programs that are a mix of MA, MAR, and MDiv degrees. Those are a Master of Arts, Master of Arts in Religion, and Master of Divinity respectively. Generally, an MAR degree is recognized as qualification for status in the lay ministry and preparation for further study. The Masters of Divinity is meant to convey status as a graduate who is prepared for ordination into a Christian faith.
The Master’s of Divinity options include such areas of focus as Church Ministries, Discipleship Ministries, Evangelism and Church Planting and Biblical Studies. The graduate degrees closest to lay studies are the master’s degrees in theology, in professional counseling, and in worship ethnomusicology. Liberty’s online options cover differing degrees of focus on the evangelical profession, broken out into an interesting mix or specialties.
There is a college in Philadelphia offers online courses in the Jewish faith, and one in Los Angeles that has a distance learning School of Buddhist Studies. There are schools with online courses in Hinduism and Islam as well, and there is a directory for comparative religion courses that has developed recently. » Read more: Online Religion and Theology Degrees
