This week we welcome Kurty Darling, who will serve for one-year as Visiting Instructor for Children, Youth, and Family (CYF) Ministry. With Andrew Root on sabbatical, Kurty will teach three courses, connect with CYF students and serve as grant manager for the Nurturing Children through Worship and Prayer initiative grant we received recently from the Lilly Endowment. She will also be lead instructor for a new nondegree residency program being launched this fall.
Kurty currently is a Ph.D. student at Luther and in September will defend her dissertation on examining the evangelical imagination around visions of flourishing life. She has a B.A. in Communication Studies and Sociology from Bethel University and an M.A. in Narrative Theology from United Theological Seminary. She also is a Life Worth Living graduate fellow through the Yale Center for Faith and Culture. She has taught for the past five years at Bethel University on the topics of Christianity and Western Culture, Great Books of the Western Humanities, Spiritual and Faith Formation, and Theological Research.
Kurty is a lifetime resident of Minnesota, having grown up on the “edge of the world” in the heart of farm country, and now proudly resides in Minneapolis. She is a mother to four children and has been married for 15 years to her husband Kirk. Their family spends evenings biking, coaching youth sports teams, swimming in the lakes, and playing kickball in the street. Kurty also serves as an elder at her church. Please join me in welcoming Kurty to Luther Seminary.
—Terri Elton
Dean of Academic Affairs