St. Francis Major Seminary in Milwaukee is being closed by the archdiocese, according to Dad29. He thinks that’s a good thing given the “uneven” quality of the training handed on there in recent years. He says that seminarians will instead be sent to Sacred Heart School of Theology. Meanwhile, the chancery will relocate its offices to the seminary grounds.
Update: More news is coming out. The seminary is not formally closing, but the faculty is being dismissed. The seminary program and the permanent diaconate program will exist as a joint venture with Sacred Heart, but the college seminary will not. They will remain on the grounds of the current seminary. All the lay ministry programs will be farmed out to other institutions.
It should be clear that this decision was made by a committee—first, because the Seminary is only “sorta, kinda” closing.
The Faculty dismissal is a very significant item; many of them are termites, at best.
But the “Henni Hall will remain [active](??)” portion speaks to the mixed conclusion of the committee which made the recommendation. It’s hard to discern exactly what this really means, except that the name of the Sem will be kept active (perhaps for future use?)
The “other ministry” and “certificate” programs were absolutely abysmal, not only in content, but in results. There are plenty of Litur-Geists in this area, with MS degrees from St Francis, who couldn’t identify a Latin word to save their lives—and that’s just for openers.